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ON THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 

AN EXPOSITION OF 
" THE DIVERSIONS OF PURLEY." 



ON 

THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 

AN EXPOSITION OF 

"EHEA HTEPOENTA, 
OR THE DIVERSIONS OF PURLEY, 

BY JOHN HORNE TOOKE." 



BY CHARLES RICHARDSON, LL.D. 

AUTHOR OF A NEW DICTIONARY OF THE 
ENGLISH LANGUAGE. 



" What an epoch in many a student's intellectual life has been 
his first acquaintance with ' The Diversions of Ptirley.' " — Trench, 
on The Study of fVords. 

" Nor did any one ever take up ' The Diversions of Purley' 
and lay it down, till some other avocation tore it from his hands." 
— Lord Brougham, Statesitien of George III. 




LONDON: 

GEORGE BELL, 186, FLEET STREET. 

1854. 



fh 



CONTENTS. 



Page 

PKEFACE vii 

Introduction to the Diversions of Parley 1 

Chap. I. — Of the Division or Distribution of Language . . 5 

II. — Some Considerations of Mr. Locke's Essay . . 8 

III.— Of the Parts of Speech 13 

Remarks on the three first Chapters 14 

IV.-Of the Noun 25 

V. — The Article and Interjection 26 

VL— Of the word " That." 28 

VII.— Of Conjunctions 33 

VIII. — Etymology of English Conjunctions .... 40 

IX. — Of Prepositions 52 

X.— Of Adverbs . 78 



VOL. II. 

Chap. I.— Of the Eights of Man 86 

II.— Of Abstraction 101 

III. — On Abstraction {continued) 118 

IV. — Change of Characteristic. Of Abstraction (conti- 
nued) 124 

V. — On Abstraction (co??ii?me(i) 172 

VL— Of Adjectives 196 

VIL— Of Participles . . . • 202 

VIII. — Participles (continued) 206 

What is the Verb ? 213 

Substance and Accident . 225 



PEEFACE. 



I HAVE thought it would be a fitting, and 
might prove a useful, employment of these last 
days of my life, if I were to prepare for publica- 
tion some papers which have for many years been 
lying by me ; — having for their object. An Expo- 
sition of the Grand Doctrines of " The Diversions 
of Purley," — by a plain, concise statement of those 
doctrines, accompanied by such notes and commen- 
taries as to me seemed requisite and proper for 
the purpose. The greater portion of these papers 
was written before the commencement of that 
happy cessation from war, and those horrors of war, 
into which a ruthless and most faithless despot has 
at this moment plunged us. Others have been 
written at different and less distant intervals. Yet 
all will lay claim to the weight that may be thought 
due to long and deliberate conviction, with the ad- 
ditional advantage of a careful revisal. 

That the Avork itself — to use the Author's own 
emphatic expression on a different occasion — " will 
live for ever,"* there can be no doubt; and it is, 
and has long been, my ambition to spread the 



* On Erskine's Speech in Defence of Hardy. See Lord Camp- 
bell's Lives of the Chancellors, vol. vi. p. 477, note. 



vm PEEFACE. 



knowledge of such its unquestionable title to im- 
mortality. 

It is unfortunately too true that the Author, by 
his vigorous attacks on all parties, and his bitter 
personalities against individual members of those 
parties, whether Whigs or Tories, or supposed fa- 
vourites of the Court, brought upon himself (and 
it is not a matter of surprise that such should be 
the consequence) the severe punishment which the 
spirit of retaliation is never slow to inflict. 

Much, undoubtedly, may be alleged in his ex- 
cuse, and Lord Brougham generously steps in, 
not, I think, as the partial advocate, but as a fair 
and enlightened judge.* The sum of his Lord- 
ship's apology is, that Home Tooke had been com- 
pelled to pay a heavy fine, and suiFer an imprison- 
ment of twelve months ; and those twelve months 
destined to be among the most active of his Kfe, for 
having written, and set his name to, a just and, 
as it would nowadays be considered, a mild de- 
nunciation of an attack by the king's troops on our 
American bretlu^en.f For his peaceful exertions to 
obtain Parliamentary Reform and good govern- 
ment for the country, he had, under many aggra- 
vating circumstances, when bent down with griev- 
ous infirmities, been hurried away in the night, 
subjected to an inquisitorial examination before a 
secret council; again flung into prison, and only 
released, after months of confinement, and after 
having his life put in jeopardy by a trial for high 

* See Statesmen in the Time of George III.— Mr. Home Tooke. 
t At Lexington, in MassachusettSj on the 19th April, 1775. 



1 



PEEFACE. IX 

treason. " These," his Lordship feelingly observes, 
, " are sufferings, which fair weather politicians 
know nothing of."* 

It is to be regretted that the passions thus ex- 
cited in the hotbed of politics, should be carried 
into the retreats of literary life ; though here again 
it may be urged in mitigation, that something po- 
litical was mingled with the literary character of 
those with whom he came principally in contact ; 
Harris, who was a Lord of the Treasury, and Dr. 
Johnson, who enjoyed a pension, and had written 
three pamphlets in defence of the measures of the 
Government. 

As far as the former, with Lord Monboddo, and 
Doctors Oswald, Reid, and Beattie are concerned, 
he pleads, in his own defence of his asperity, the 
manner in which they treat the " vulgar, un- 
learned, and atheistical Mr. Locke " (for such are 
the imputations they cast upon that benefactor of 
his country) ; on Locke, " whom (as Ben Jonson 
says of Shakespeare) I reverence on this side of 
Idolatry." 

It was during the first imprisonment that he 
wrote his Letter to Mr. Dunning, afterwards 
Lord Ashburtonf (who was not. Lord Chatham 

* Another circumstance vitally affecting Tooke's prospects in 
life, must not be omitted. The refusal of the Benchers of the 
Inner Temple to admit him to the Bar, after quitting the Order of 
Clergy. This Lord Brougham ascribes to " the indelible nature 
of English Orders ; " but the suffei*er himself to political perse- 
cution. The question seems likely to be revived. 

t Dunning married a sister of Sir Francis Baring, in whose 
sbn, Alexander, the extinct title wsm revived. 



X PREFACE. 

affirmed, a lawyer, but law itself); in which he 
appeared for the first time before the public as a 
philosophical grammarian, and in which is to be 
found all that he had ever afterwards to say on the 
conjunctions. 

The Author tells us that at the time of writinsr 

o 

the letter,* he was in the King's Bench Prison, 
" the miserable victim of two prepositions and 
a conjunction." The expression has often been 
quoted, and deserves to be explained. 

The information filed against him, charged that 
he, John Home, did write and publish, &c., a cer- 
tain false, wicked and seditious libel of and concern- 
ing his Majesty's Government, and the employ- 
ment of his troops, according to the tenor, &c. On 
the trial a verdict of Guilty was returned ; and a 
question was raised by Home — first on motion in 
arrest of Judgment, and afterAvards on Writ of 
Error in the House of Lords ; whether the writing 
contained in the information, was, in point of law, 
sufficiently charged to be a libel upon his Majesty's 
Government. And it was in both Courts decided 
in favour of the Crown. In the meantime the pe- 
riod of imprisonment had expired, to which the 
miserable victim of the two prepositions and con- 
junction, " of and concerning," had been con- 
demned. And thus he had suffered the full penalty 
of the sentence before it had been determined that 
he had been guilty of any crime. 

It was on this first trial that, as Lord Campbell 

* It is dated, April 21, 1778. 



PEEFACE. XI 

candidly and not, I hope, inadvertently, acknow- 
ledges that his countryman, the noble earl, the ve- 
nerable judge, " confident in the anti- Yankee feel- 
ings " of the jury, so framed his charge as to secure 
from them a verdict of Guilty ! ! 

And it is in introducing the event of the second 
trial (referred to by Lord Brougham), that Lord 
Campbell declares himself wholly at a loss to ac- 
count for the infatuated obstinacy exhibited by 
the Crown lawyers, after the trial and acquittal of 
the first of the number charged with treasonable 
conspiracy. " To the amazement of the public," 
says his Lordship, " it was announced that another 
prisoner was to be tried on the same charge and 
the same evidence, and that this prisoner was 
John Hokne Tooke, a man popular by his 
agreeable manners, admired for his literary acquire- 
ments, who had ever conducted himself with cau- 
tion and discretion (and), knoAvn to be aristocratic 
in his inclinations . . . Yes ! John Hokne Tooke, 
with a constitution broken by age and disease, but 
with a mind as alert and youthful as when he 
wrote against Junius, and spoke against Thurlow, 
was next called upon to hold up his hand at the 
Bar of the Old Bailey." * 

Thus much I have felt it incumbent upon me to 
introduce, with a view to make the reader ac- 
quainted with the true character of our Author; 
and surely it is now high time that angry feelings 
should subside, and that the offences of the man, 

* Lives of the Chancellors, vol. vi. p. 485. 



XU PREFACE. 

whatever thej may have been, should no longer 
have an influence in estimating the value of his 
work ; and yet it unhappily must be acknowledged 
that such feelings, even at the present day, are some- 
times suffered to burst forth with all their early 
virulence. 

It is full forty years, be it remembered, since 
Chantrey laid the foundations of his own fame and 
fortune, by immortalizing the features of " the old 
man, wasted by sickness, with a night-cap on his 
head, totally unlike his former self, but fearfully 
like him at the present moment."* The old man 
survived about fourteen months. 

I am willing to believe, however, though pre- 
possessions and prejudices are long preserved aa 
traditionary mischiefs, that in various quarters, 
among scholars, and philosophers also, " The Diver- 
sions of Purley " is a work which does now receive 
a more candid and impartial, and consequently a 
more enlightened consideration, than has been al- 
lowed to it in times past. Hence I derive some 
encouragement to believe also that this my contri- 
bution to the diffusion of the doctrines it inculcates, 
will be welcomed as an acceptable addition to our 
stock of philosophical philology. It has been under 



* Stephens' Life of Tooke, v. ii. p. 412. Chantrey 's bust of 
Home Tooke was exhibited at Somerset House in 1811. Tooke 
died in March, 1812. Such and so great were the acknowledged 
merits of this bust, that it obtained for the artist commissions to 
the amount of d£' 10,000. Nollekens was so pleased with this pro- 
duction of a young artist, that he desired one of his own busts to 
be removed, and Chantrey 's put in its place.— See Jones' Eecol- 
leciions, and Holland's Memorial, of Sir F. Chantrey. 



PEEFACE. Xm 

this persuasion, and conceiving it to be an official 
dutj entirely within my province, that I have un- 
dertaken the publication of this little book. My 
familiarity with the great work itself, and the con- 
stant, and I trust not unsuccessful, use I have made 
of its principles in the composition of the English 
DiCTiONAEY, may justify a presumption that I am, 
at least not ill, prepared for the performance ; and 
especially so since, as I have already observed, the 
materials have been so long in manuscript before 
me. 

There is one circumstance which I must not 
omit to notice ; that modern philologers have far 
too singly directed their own researches, and di- 
verted the views of the student in language, to other 
channels, — those of affinities or ethnological resem- 
blances, — and, in pursuing their own course, have 
somewhat ungratefully ignored the very existence 
of the work of their great teacher. 

But writers less confined, or I would say, much 
more enlarged in their speculations,* have arisen 
among us ; and the attention of scholars in every 
class of society has recently been aroused to the 
peculiar and exclusive merits of " The Diversions of 
Purley ; " particularly by Mr. Trench, in the Pre- 
face to his popular lectures " On the Study of 
Words, "f He there declares his opinion, that " the 
first acquaintance with ' The Diversions of Purley ' 



* See hereafter the quotations from " Guesses at Truth," &c. 
p. 95. 

f Addressed (originally) to the Pupils at the Diocesan Training 
School, Winchester, 



XIV PEEPACE. 

must have formed an epocli in the life of many a 
student." In this opinion I most cordially agree. 
But Lord Brougham bears more ample and decisive 
testimony both as to the intrinsic merits and at- 
tractive qualities of the work. " The simple gran- 
deur," says his Lordship, " of the leading idea 
which runs through the whole of Mr. Tooke's sys- 
tem, at once recommends it to our acceptation. 
But the details of the theory are its great merit, 
for he followed it into every minute particular of 
our language, and only left it imperfect in confining 
his speculations to the English tongue, wliile 
doubtless the doctrine is of universal application. 
He had great resources for the performance of the 
task which he thus set himself. A master of the 
old Saxon, the root of our noble language ; tho- 
roughly and familiarly acquainted with our best 
writers; sufficiently skilled in other tongues, an- 
cient and modern,* ... he could trace with a clear 
and steady eye the relations and derivations of all 
our parts of speech, and in delivering his remarks, 
whether to illustrate his own principles, or to ex- 
pose the errors of other theories, or to controvert 
and expose to ridicule his predecessors, his never- 
failing ingenuity and ready wit stood him in such 
constant stead, that he has made one of the dryest 
subjects in the whole range of literature or science, 
one of the most amusing and lively of books ; nor 
did any one ever take it up and lay it down till 
some other avocation tore it from his hands." — 

* In old and modern French and Italian, not only sufnciently 
skilled, but deeply learned. 



PEEFACE. XV 

" And, as every thing which had been done before 
was superseded by it, so nothing has since been 
effected, unless in pursuing its views and building 
upon its solid foundations."* 

The names of Brougham and Trench (to which 
that of Mackintosh may be added f) are the names 
of no common men, not indeed of learned linguists 
and grammarians, but of enlightened philosophers, 
and I must confess give me additional encouragement 
in this my long deferred attempt to extend the utility 
of the work by a full and fair exposition of its 
principles, and by an endeavour to illustrate " the 
simple grandeur of its leading idea," and also, as I 
proceed, to remove -some wrong impressions, which 
have been received by writers of great ability and 
authority in those branches of philosophy not only 
most intimately connected with, but moreover in- 
deed ultimately dependent on, the Philosophy of 
Language. To these objects I shall strictly con- 
fine myself. Much of the spirit, which the form 
of dialogue occasionally gives to the original, espe- 
cially at the outset, must be necessarily lost, and 
those sallies of wit against some, and pungent sar- 
casms against others, by whom the author thought 
himself (and not unnaturally) both maligned and 
injured, are entirely witliheld. 



* Statesmen in the Time of George III. — Mr. Home Tooke. 
t See infra, p. 36. 



Note, p. 154. 

I owe it to the great Names of Grimm, Pott and Bopp, to supply 
an omission in the text. I ought not to have passed unnoticed 
(and I regret that I did), that these opinions of our Author with 
respect to the origin of the Latin from the Greek and Gothic, 
and to the higher antiquity of the Gothic above the Latin — " That 
the Latin is " (in fact) " a mere modern Language compared with 
the Anglo-Saxon," are contended by these eminent Scholars to be 
altogether erroneous. But to their respective works I must 
refer those, whose course of study is directed to the pursuit of 
such curious and learned inquiries. 



INTEODUCTION TO THE DIVERSIONS 
OF PUELEY. 

THE scene of the dialogue is laid at Purley, 
in the neighbourhood of Croydon, a seat there 
in the occupation of Mr. Tooke.* There Home 
is found domesticated by the then Bishop of Glou- 
cester, Dr. Richard Beadon, a friend of both host 
and guest, and who was called as a witness in de- 
fence of the latter, when arraigned as a traitor at 
the bar of the Old Bailey. The conversation com- 
mences by the Bishop's bantering Home on his 
partiality to the spot ; for it was formerly the seat 
of the noted Bradshaw, who sat as president at the 
trial of Charles the First ; and very probably the 
place had its attractions on that account. 

Politics, however, are said to be strangers there ; 
and the Doctor is informed, that the last topic of 
discussion had been an opinion advanced by Home 
(an opinion at this time very likely to find favour 
with numerous zealous advocates for the extension 
of Education among the middle, and to the hum- 
bler classes of society), " that all sorts of wisdom 



* From the place the book received its title, and from the oc- 
cupier the author received his second name. 
B 



2 INTEODUCTION TO THE 

and useful knowledge may be attained by a man 
of plain sense without what is commonly called 
learning." Grammar, is, to the surprise of the Host 
and the Doctor, excepted by Home ; who thinks 
Grammar (meaning Philosophical Grammar) diffi- 
cult ; yet, though difficult, " to be absolutely ne- 
cessary in the search after philosophical truth, 
which, if not the most useful, is at least the most 
pleasing employment of the human mind — ^and to 
be no less necessary in the most important ques- 
tions concerning religion and ci\Tl society." Our 
Enghsh Grammar, the Doctor replies, may be suf- 
ficiently and easily learnt from Dr. Lowth, or from 
the^r^^* (as well as best) English Grammar, by B. 
Jonson. And when not grammar in the common 
acceptation, but the causes and reasons of grammar 
are stated to be the points on which satisfactory 
information is required, the Doctor with an air of 
triumph refers to the Heemes of Haeeis, a work 
which Lowth had pronounced to be " the most 
beautiful and perfect analysis that had been exlii- 
bited since the days of Aristotle." And if the 
skill of the workmanship (Mulciber iUic) be alone 
considered, the praise may not be much exagge- 
rated. 

That book, however, is rejected by Tooke and 
Home; the former asserting that he could not 
" boast of any acqidsition from its perusal, except. 



* This is a mistake. Gill and Butler preceded Jonson. His 
grammar was posthumous; and not published till the year 1640, 
three years after the author's death. Gill's appeared in 1621, 
2nd Ed. Butlers in 1633. 



DIVEESIONS OF PURLEY. 3 

indeed, of hard words and frivolous or unintelligi- 
ble distinctions."* And tlie latter subsequently 
describes it to be " an improved compilation of 
almost all the errours, which grammarians have 
been accumulating from the time of Aristotle down 
to our present days of technical and learned aifec- 
tation."t 

The introductory dialogue ends with Home un- 
dertaking to attempt (though at the risk of expo- 
sing hunself) an investigation into the principles of 
Philosophical Grammar: a subject J not entirely 
new to liis thoughts; for he observes, " I very 
early found it or thought I found it, impossible to 
make many steps in the search after truth, and the 
nature of human understanding, of good and evil, 
of right and wrong ; without well considering the 
nature of language, which appeared to me to be 
inseparably connected with them."§ 

" You will begin then," says the Bishop, " either 
with things or ideas : for it is impossible we should 
ever thoroughly understand the nature of the sigjis, 
unless we first properly consider and arrange the 
things signified.^'' 

Our author acknowledges this to be true: but 
nevertheless determines to commence with " The 
Distribution of Language^'' for as Hermes is re- 



* D. of P. Introduction, p. 7, 4to. Ed. 

t C. 7, p. 120. 

X It appears from the evidence of Dr. Beadon on Tooke's trial 
in 1794, that Home, when at Cambridge, had directed and was 
eagerly pursuing his researches into this subject. 

§ Introduction, p. 12. 



4 DIVEESIONS OF PUELEY. 

corded to liave put out tlie eyes of Argus, and as 
it may be suspected lie has likewise blinded phi- 
losophy, it is to language we must resort with a 
view to detect by what means the delusion has been 
effected, 



I 



CHAP. I. 

or THE DIVISION OR DISTRIBUTION OF 
LANGUAGE. 

THE author starts with the first purpose of 
language — to communicate our thoughts. 
The ancient grammarians, confining themselves to 
this principle, reasoned thus : — words are the signs 
of things : — there must, therefore, be as many sorts 
of words or parts of speech as there are sorts of 
things. How many, then, are the sorts of things, 
and consequently the sorts of words ? Of the former 
it was agreed that there are two : 1. Res, qujB per- 
manent; 2. Res, quae fluunt. Therefore, there 
must be two of the latter: 1. Notee rerum, quse 
permanent, (or the noun); 2. Notae rerum, quae 
fluunt, (or the verb).* 

But still there are words, neither Not^ rerum 



* Sanctius, in illustration of these expressions, " Res, qu£e 
permanent," and " res quae fluunt," observes, that whatever is 
spoken of, is either permanent ; as arbor, a tree ; durum, hard : 
or fluent ; as currit, he runs 5 dormit, he sleeps. That is, a tree 
is (by nature) always a tree ; but he (any man) does not (by na- 
ture) always run or always sleep. 

"Quod Grseci, bv vocant : — id partim significat res perma- 
nentes : — partim _y?«enfes. In hac partitione tota vis orationis nos- 
trse consistit : — Constantium igitur rerum notam, nomen dixere : 
earum vero, quae fluunt, verbum.^^ Scaliger de Causis, Cap, 72. 
And Sanctius : — " Quidquid enunciatur, aut est permanens, ut 



6 OF THE DIVISION OR 

permanentium ; nor, Not£e rerum fluentium: call 
them all particles or inferior parts of speech : or, 
as, by their constant interposition between nouns 
and verbs, they seem in a manner to hold speech 
together, call them conjunctions or connexives. 
Here then were three parts of speech. About the 
time of Aristotle, a fourth, the article or definitive, 
was added.* 

Here the search for different sorts of words from 
difference of things ended. The difficulty then was, 
under which of these four classes each word should 
be placed ; and the method of proceeding became 
reversed ; and still allowing that there must be as 
many sorts of words as of things, these learned 
grammarians adopted the converse — that there 
must be as many differences of things as of signs ; 
and many laborious grammarians confined them- 

Arbor, Durum : aut fluens, ut currit, dormit. Ees permanentes 
sh'^e constaBtes vocamus, quarum natura diu perstat : harum no- 
tam NoMEN dixere. Muentes dicimtis, quarum natura est, esse 
tamdiu, quamdiu fiunt. Harum nota Verbum est. Rursus ver- 
bis et nominibus deerat Modus, per quern causarum ratio explica- 
retur. Hie in nominibus dicitur pr^positio : ut versatur in te- 
nebris propter ignorantiam. In verbis est Adverbium : Nam si 
qualitatem innuas, dices ; bene currit : si tempus, hodie legam. 
Postremo orationes ipse inter se indigebant ligaturis : quare coji- 
junctio fuit excogitata, Hsec Plato. Lib. de Ente. Sanctii Mi- 
nerva, Lib. 1, c. 2. 

* Veteres enim, quorum fuerunt Aristoteles atque Theodecles, 
verba modo, et nomina, et convinctiones tradiderunt. Videlicet 
quod in verbis, vim sermonis, in nominibus, materiam, (quia 
alteram est quod loquimur, alterum de quo,) in convinctionibus 
autem complexum eorum esse judicaverunt : — Paulatim a philo- 
sophis ac maxime Stoicis auctus est numerus, ac primum con- 
vinctionibus articuli adjecti, i^ost prepositiones, &c. Quint. Lib. 1. 
c. 4. 



I 



DISTRIBUTION OF LANGUAGE. 7 

selves to the differences observable in words, with- 
out any regard to the things signified. Hence the 
parts of speech have varied in number ; and at last 
eight became usually acknowledged, though many 
did not include the same parts in their list.* 

Though modern grammarians (after Aristotle) 
assert words to be the signs — not of things, but of 
ideas, thus approaching so far nearer to the truth ; 
the nature of language has not become much better 
understood, for they now supposed different opera- 
tions of mind to enable them to account for what 
different things were to account before: adding 
operation after operation as they imagined a ne- 
cessity to do so. 

It has been said that the ancient grammarians 
confined themselves to the principle, that the 
first purpose of language was to communicate our 
thoughts ; they neglected the second ; viz. to com- 
municate those thoughts with despatch. | And hence 
the course of error into which they have been 
misled. Proceeding upon the definition that words 
are the signs of things or ideas, they have assumed 



* For instance, Gill distinguishes the parts of speech into 
noun, verb, and consignificative ; including the adjective and pro- 
noun w^ithin the noun : and in the consignificatives, the article, ad- 
verb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection. Butler ; — into 
noun and verb, preposition and adverb, including, as Gill does, 
the adjective and pronoun vi^ithin the noun ; and the conjunction 
he considers to be a sort of adverb. B. Jonson classes the article 
with the pronoun, the adjective with the noun (substantive) the 
interjection and preposition with the adverb, and distributes the 
conjunctions under several heads. 

f Locke lays down distinctly these two obvious purposes, and 
yet he is guilty of the same neglect. 



8 SOME CONSIDERATIONS 

that all words are immediately so ; whereas many- 
are abbreviations employed for despatch, and are 
the signs of other words. The invention of all 
ages has been upon the stretch to add such wings 
to their conversation as might enable it, if possible, 
to keep pace in some measure with then* minds. 
ISTot, then, from difference of things, not from dif- 
ferent operations of the mind : but hence, — from 
abbreviations for despatch (those wings of Mercury) 
arises the variety of words. 

Abbre^aations are employed in language. 1. In 
terms. 2. In sorts of words. 3. In construction. 
Upon the two former the respective excellence of 
every language depends. To the first Locke's 
Essay is the best guide. The second is the subject 
of the Diversions of Purley. 



CHAP. 11. 



THOUGH Locke hhnself had not the least 
thought when he first began his discourse of 
the understanding, nor a good Avhile after, that any 
consideration of words was at all necessary to it,* 
yet is the whole of his essay a philosophical ac- 
count of the first sort of abbreviations, that is, in 
terms. Inquiry into the origin of ideas is a proper 
commencement for a grammarian who is to treat 

* Essay, Book 3, Chap. 9, § 22. 



OF ME. LOCKE'S ESSAY. \) 

of their signs ; but he was not singular in referring 
them to the senses, nor in so beginning an account 
of language.* Had he sooner been aware of the 
inseparable connexion between words and know- 
ledge, he might have discerned that there was no 
composition in ideas, but only in terms ; that it was 
as improper to speak of a complex idea, as to call a 
constellation a complex star ; that not ideas, but 
terms, are general and abstract. He would have 
weighed not alone the imperfections, but the per- 
fections of language ; these perfections not properly 
understood being one of the chief causes of the im- 
perfections of our philosophy. He himself remarks 
in his last chapter, speaking of the doctrine of signs, 
^* The consideration, then, of ideas and words, as 
the great instruments of knowledge, makes no des- 
picable part of their contemplation, who would 
take a view of human knowledge in the whole ex- 
tent of it. And perhaps if they were distinctly 
weighed and duly considered, they would afford us 
another sort of logic and critic than what we have 
hitherto been acquainted with." Further he ac- 



* " Philosophers that highten Stoiciens wende that the soule had 
bee naked of hymself, as a mirrour, or a cleane perchemine^' (parch- 
ment), " so that all figures musten comen for thynges fro without 
in to soules, and been emprinted in to soules right as we been 
wonte, some tyme by a swifte pointen to fixen letters emprinted 
in the smothnesse or in the plainesse of the parchemine that hath 
no figure, ne note in it." Chaucer Boetius, B. 5, Met. 4. Du- 
tens, in his very curious work. On the Origin of the Discoveries 
attributed to the moderns, refers to the authors from whom we 
may trace the axiom falsely ascribed to Aristotle — " That there 
is nothing in the understanding, but what entered into it by the 
senses." 



10 SOME CONSIDERATIONS 

knowledges tliat " when having passed over the 
original and composition of our ideas,* I began to 
examine the extent and certainty of our knowledge, 
I found it had so intimate a connection with words, 
that unless the force and manner of signification of 
words are first well observed, there can be very 
little said clearly and pertinently concerning know- 
ledge." But though this is the declared reason of 
writing his 3rd Book, concerning language as dis- 
tinct from ideas ^ yet he continues to treat singly as 
before, concerning the force of words, " names of 
ideas in the mind," (which force depends on the 
number of ideas of which that word is the sign,) and 
has not advanced one syllable concerning the man- 
ner of signification : he had not settled his opinion 
on the subject; it remained with him a desidera- 
tum, as it did with our great Bacon before him. 

The argument used by Locke against innate 
ideas, viz. that the supposition of them is unneces- 
sary, is equally valid against the composition of ideas 
— their supposition is unnecessary. Every purpose 
for which it was imagined may be more easily and 
naturally answered by the composition r?/* terms; 
while at the same time the latter does, likewise, 
clear up many difficulties in which the former in- 
volves us. 



* Tooke asserting that all in Locke's Essay, which relates to 
what he calls the composition, abstraction, &c. of ideas, does in- 
deed merely concern language, observes, " It may appear pre- 
sumptuous, but it is necessary here to declare my opinion, that 
Mr. Locke in his Essay never did advance one step beyond the 
origin of ideas and the composition of terms." 



OF MR. Locke's essay. 11 

Locke must be allowed to give his own expla- 
nation of that operation of the mind which he calls 
the Composition of Ideas : it is that " whereby 
it puts together those simple ideas it has received 
from sensation and reflection^ and combines them 
into complex ideas."* Though he would say that 
the word man was the sign of a collection of ideas, 
(and it is greatly to be regretted that he did not 
see the difference between the terms collection and 
composition,) and the word army to be the sign of 
a larger collection ; he would compound these col- 
lections of ideas — of ideas of sensible qualities, con- 
sisting of an indescribable variety of forms and 
colours, into one complex idea of form and colour."! 
But if the essay be read with attention and the 
composition of terms, &c. be substituted wherever 
a composition of ideas, &c. is supposed, the con- 
clusions of the author will be equally true and 
clear, and no other argument will be needed against 
the composition of ideas. 

Further, it is an easy matter upon Locke's own 
principles, and a physical consideration of the senses 
and the mind, to prove the impossibility of the 
composition of ideas. 

" Though the qualities," he tells us, " that affect 
our senses, are in themselves so united and blended, 
that there is no separation, no distance between 
them : yet it is plain the ideas they produce in the 
mind enter by the senses, simple and unmixed. 



* Essay, Book 2, Chap. 11, § 6. 

t See hereafter Locke's Notions of Substance. 



12 MR. Locke's essay. 

The hand feels softness and warmth in the same 
piece of wax, yet the simple ideas thus united in 
the same subject, are as perfectly distinct as those 
that come in by different senses." It is true they 
are distinct, and must remain so : the mind must 
ever preserve them so; it has no internal sense 
wherewith to compound them. Locke's internal 
sense of reflection has no such power, and indeed 
no such power is ascribed to it by him. But the 
argument applied by Tooke is of itself sufficient, — 
their supposition is unnecessary.* 

Locke, in his 3rd Book, Chap. 7, on Language 
in General, divides words into nouns and particles; 
the latter should then have comprized all the other 
parts of speech, not excepting the verb : he de- 
clares these particles to be all marks of some action 
or inclination of the mind : and adopting the opi- 
nion of Aristotle, Scaliger and Port Boyal, that 
" is\ and is not, are also the general marks of the 
mind, affirming or denying :" that thus affirming 
and denying are operations of the mind, he referred 
all the sorts of words classed by hhn under the 
name of particle, to the same source, namely, the 
operations of the mind : though if they had been 
so to be accounted for, it was almost impossible they 
could have escaped his penetration. 

* Essay, Book 2, Chap. 2, § 1. 

t As to this copula, see Hobbes' Works, folio Edition, p. 400. 
Kingdom of Darkness, Part 4, Chap. 6. 



13 
CHAP. III. 

OF THE PARTS OF SPEECH. 

THE difference of things, the difference of 
ideas, the different operations of the human 
mind being rejected, as guides to the division of lan- 
guage into parts of speech, the two great purposes 
of speech, namely, communication and despatch, 
lead to the only principles upon which to proceed : 
First, to words necessary for the communication of 
thoughts : namely, the noun and verb. Secondly, 
to abbreviations employed for the sake of despatch, 
and which abbreviations are strictly parts of speech 
because they are all useful in language, and each 
has a different manner of signification. The dis- 
tinction between the two classes should however 
still be observed. 

The necessary words are not signs of different 
sort of ideas, nor of different operations of the mind ; 
such operations (so called) are merely the ope- 
rations of language. The business of the mind, as 
far as it concerns language, extends no further than 
to receive impressions, that is, to have sensations 
or feelings. A consideration of ideas, or of the 
mind, or of things (relative to the parts of speech,) 
will lead us no further than to nouns, that is, to 
the signs of those impressions or names of ideas. 
The verb must be accounted for from the necessary 
use of it in communication. It is, in fact, the com- 



14 REMARKS ON THE 

munication itself, and therefore well called Pr//za, 
dictum. For the verb is quod loquimur ; the noun, 
de quo. 



REMARKS ON THE THREE FIRST CHAPTERS. 

WE are now arrived at the conclusion of the 
three first chapters, through which I have 
thought it advisable to continue in direct progress 
without interruption. Oiu' Author has laid clearly 
before us the branch of Philosophical Grammar on 
which he has undertaken to treat; distinguishing 
it precisely from that to which he considers Locke 
to have confined himself. 

He has further, on the way, uisisted that terms, 
and not ideas, are complex, general, and abstract ; 
and that all in Locke's Essay which relates to such 
supposed ideas, merely concern language. 

Further still, he has put himself boldly at issue 
with the logician and metaphysician, (who have 
been, and I fear still are, too prone to undervalue 
his labours,) with respect to the operations of the 
mind: a stmnbling-block, most undoubtedly, that 
usually encounters us at the commencement of trea- 
tises on lo^ic. 

Our Author asserts these operations to be 
merely operations of language. " What," says Dr. 
Stoddart, " can be meant by operations of lan- 
guage ? Every operation must have an operator. 
It is the operator that causes the operation, and not 
the contrary. It is not the amputation that causes 



THREE FIRST CHAPTERS. 15 

the surgeon, but the surgeon* that performs the 
amputation. It is not the furrow that directs the 
ploughman, but the ploughman who, guiding his 
plough, gives shape to the furrow, "f 

These are truisms, correctly understood. The 
plough of the plouglnnan could not perform the 
operation of ploughing without his guiding hand ; 
nor could the hand perform it without his guiding 
will. Neither could the plouglnnan himself perform 
the operation without the hand, nor the hand with- 
out the plough. Each has its office : the physical 
or material operation demands and employs physical 
or material agents. The will of the man sets those 
agents in motion, and guides the operation as they 
progressively perform it. 

The grand truth on which the position of Home 
Tooke rests is, not expressly indeed, but impliedly, 
as being manifest and unquestionable, — ^that the 
mind wills the whole operation : volition is its power, 
and by that power it puts in action, it actuates, 
guides and governs the physical organs of speech ; 
and by them are the operations of speech performed. 

But before I proceed with a more particular re- 



* Consistency requires, " The surgeon guiding his instrument^ 
who." 

f Philosophy of Language, p. 22. This work, which displays 
very extensive reading, is an entire reconstruction of the Grammar 
published upwards of thirty -five years ago, in the first vol. of the 
4to. Ed, of the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana. The objections 
there urged against this doctrine of Tooke differ from those quoted 
above, and were replied to in the Gentleman's Magazine for May, 
1841, p. 477, and that reply may perhaps have occasioned the 
change. 



16 REMARKS ON THE 

ply to the objections of Dr. Stoddart, it seems ex- 
pedient to direct attention to the operations of the 
mind as they are taught by our logical professors 
at Oxford : Logic is^ I believe, the pride of that 
noble University, and it is scarcely a matter of 
choice, that I should adopt as a text-book on which 
to ground the ensuing commentaries, " The Com- 
pendivim of the Art of Logic,"* stUl used as a ma- 
nual (with which no rival is permitted to interfere) 
by those students who are ambitious to include that 
art within the cu'cle of their acquirements. 

The Author of this highly-prized little bookf 
avows himself a disciple of Aristotle, and he evi- 
dences a great mastery over all the forms of his art, 
and great subtlety in arranging and expounding 
them. It is worthy of remark, in passing, that, 
though in almost every branch of science great 
changes have taken place, and great advancement 
effected, yet in these chapters in the Oxford Logic 
(on the operations of the mind,) scarcely has an at- 
tempt been made beyond the simplification of some 
forms and the correction of some incongruities in 
the detail of rules, which deserve no higher title 
than that of technical. | 



* Artis Logicse Compendium ; first published 1692. 

t Dr. Henry Aldrich, Dean of Christ Church. 

J The Rev. H. L. Mansell has lately published '' Artis Rudi- 
menta Logicae, from the Text of Aldrich, with Notes and Mar- 
ginal References." The notes are at continual variance with the 
text, so that the Oxford student has the double duty of learning 
and unlearning. And yet Aldrich is declared to stand without a 
rival. These notes, however, have no bearing on the points at 
issue. 



THREE FIRST CHAPTERS. 17 

The Compendium commences with enumerating 
the operations of the mind to be in the whole three. 
1. Simplex apprehensio. 2. Judicium. 3. Dis- 
cursus. Simple apprehension is again divided into 
incomplex and complex. Simplex apprehensio, or 
Simple apprehension, that is to say, the operation of 
simple apprehension or of apprehending simply, is 
defined by Aldrich to be " Nudus rei conceptus in- 
tellectivus, similis quodam modo perceptioni sensi- 
tivae." " Apprehensio simplex incomplexa, est unius 
objecti, ut calami; vel etiam plurium, confuse, ut 
calami, manus, etc. Complexa, plurium, sed cum 
ordine quodam et respectu ; ut calami in manu."* 

Dr. Whately says that Logical writers define the 
operation (or state) of mind called Simple appre- 
hension, to be " that act or condition of mind in 
which it receives a notion of any object, and which 
is analagous to the perception of the senses." f And 



* Mr. Mansell observes, ' That this confused apprehension of 
many objects (said by Aldrich to be simplex incomplex) is in truth 
only a succession of single apprehensions : ' surely not a succession, 
unless the objects are presented, not simultaneously, but succes- 
sively. He condemns the distinction between incomplex and com- 
plex as inaccurate. It is really absurd to suppose any different 
operation of the mind employed ; but, I would ask, does not Mr. 
Mansell himself use this word, apprehension, somewhat confuse. 
Such is no uncommon case. It is sometimes applied as the name 
of a faculty : sometimes as that of an operation : and again, as 
that of a thought, an opinion, a notion, or concept, (a favourite 
word with Sir W. Hamilton.) 

f In editions of his logic previous to the year 1841, Dr.Whate- 
ly's definition was, simple apprehension is " The notion (or con- 
ception) of any object in the mind analagous to the perception of 
the senses." This confusion of an operation with the notion (or 
conception) received by such operation, was pointed out in the 
C 



18 REMARKS ON THE 

lie preserves Aldrich's division of Simple into In- 
complex and Complex, and illustrates in a similar 
manner. 

There is something very offensive to the common 
sense of common understanding in the distinction 
asserted : That, when the objects are several, the 
simplex incomplexa is a sunple apprehension of these 
objects " confuse!^ according to Aldrich, or " with- 
out any relation being perceived between them," as 
Dr. ^Vhately expresses it; and that the simplex 
complexa is a simple apprehension of these same ob- 
jects, " sed cum ordine quodam et respectu," or 
" with a relation between them." 

To proceed to the next operation — Judgment. 
" Judicium," says Aldrich, "est, quo mens non solum 
percipit duo objecta, sed, quasi pro tribunali sedens, 
expresse apud se pronuntiat, ilia inter se convenire 
aut dissidere." And adds, it is affirmative or nega- 
tive. Dr. TYhately, " Judgment is the comparing 
together in the mind two of the notions (or ideas) 
which are the objects of apprehension, whether 
complex or incomplex, and pronouncing that they 
agree or disagree with each other ; (or that one of 
them belongs or does not belong to each other)." 
And he also adds, " Judgment, therefore, is either 
affirmative or negative,"* 

Let us now retrace our steps. By the operation — 
simple apprehension incomj^lex, we apprehend a 

Gent. Mag. for May, 1841. And hence, it may be presumed, the 
change from Notion (or conception) to the Act or condition of the 
mind in which it receives a Notion. 

* The reader will observe a strange want of uniformity in the 
generic terms of all these definitions. 



THREE FIRST CHAPTERS. 19 

pen, a hand — or, a man, a horse, cards: by the 
operation — simple apprehension complex, we appre- 
hend the pen in the hand or the man on the horse, 
or the cards in a pack. By Judgment the mind 
compares the pen and the hand, the man and the 
horse, the cards and the pack ; and pronounces that 
the pen is not the hand, nor the hand the pen ; that 
the hand holds the pen, not the pen the hand; 
that the horse carries the man, and not the man 
the horse. 

Now, in the first place, it is quite clear that the 
mind pronounces no such thing ; and in the second, 
that in the whole process, instead of this shifting of 
operations, one power or faculty, and one alone, ex- 
ists in act, and that from simple apprehension to 
final judgment, its persistence in act is described, 
and nothing more. 

The mind perceives (by the faculty of apprehen- 
sion or the operation, if it please the learned logi- 
cians so to name it) the hand, the pen, the man, the 
horse. It receives different sensations or ideas : it 
is conscious (or to use a word from the philosophy 
of Leibnitz, has an apperception) that these sensa- 
tions differ, and this decides the whole matter — that 
the pen and man are not the hand and horse ; that 
the pen holds the hand and the man rides the horse. 
The mind perceives this, and this is all that per se 
it can do. It pronounces nothing, it affirms or de- 
nies nothing to itself about agreement or disagree- 
ment ; it recognises (or apperceives) differ erit sen- 
sations, and there ends all that takes place in the 
mind. 



20 KEMAEKS ON THE 

But tlie faculty of speecli enables it to commu- 
nicate these different sensations or ideas existing in 
itself to others ; to pronounce, to affirm or deny to 
others the agreement or disagreement (that is, the 
different sensations) recognized within itself: in 
other words, it is by speech that this operation is 
performed. 

The ancient Epicureans went so far in their phi- 
losophy as to maintain that the senses neither affirm 
nor deny ; that to perform this operation was the 
office of a superior faculty,* the mind. In this, — 
the supposition that affirming and denying are ope- 
rations of the mind, they are in unison with the 
Aristotelians. But I think it may be shown that, 
though the perception of what ought to be affirmed 
or denied is the province of the mind, the operation 
itself is performed by words. The contrary dogma 
has been assumed as unquestionable by the follow- 
ers of the ancient philosophers, and has been taken 
for granted from their days to the present time 
without any discussion. 

The question from its novelty and importance 
deserves to be stated and illustrated with every 
possible degree of perspicuity; and what I have 



* Non falli autem sensum ideb asserit : quod falsitas omnis in 
affirmatione aut negatione sita sit (quatenus nempe aliqua res aut 
talis affirmat, qualis non est, talis negatur qualis est). Sensixs 
autem neque affirmet neque neget, sed solum in se speciem sensi- 
bili, rei excipiat, nudeque apprehendat rem eujusmodi sibi per 
speciem apparet. Px'onunciare autem, sive judicare, talis ne re- 
vera sit aut non sit eujusmodi apparet, hoc sensus ipsius non est, 
sed superioris facultatis cui proinde, non vero sensui, subesse 
possit falsitas. — Gassendi Opera, N. 1, p. 53. 



THREE riEST CHAPTERS. 21 

now to say will complete my reply to Sir John 
Stoddart. 

Let me endeavour to illustrate my meaning : — 
" Will you," says Hamlet, " play upon this pipe ? 
Govern these ventages with your fingers and thumb, 
give it breath with your mouth, and it will dis- 
course most eloquent music." The recorder will 
speak ; not by an operation of the mind, but by the 
operations prescribed by the poet. 

We never say the mind amputates a limb,, ex- 
tracts a tooth, or couches a cataract. 

We never ascribe the dissection of a human body 
to an operation of the human mind. We call it, — 
properly call this, chirurgery (or surgery) a ma- 
nual operation, an operation of the hand ; the hand 
and the knife are the instruments ; they move, they 
act, they operate. There is in all such operations 
instrumentality governing subordinate instrumen- 
tality ; the hand, itself a material instrument, guides 
in each case an appropriate subordinate instrument, 
and thus the operation is performed. The mind, 
the ruler of every voluntary motion, wills the move- 
ments of the hand; perceives, superintends, and di- 
rects them. Mastication, deglutition follow, the 
one the other, as voluntary motions, and we duly 
attribute them to their peculiar organs. The mind 
does not infuse volition into the hand, the jaws, and 
the throat ; neither do they impart operation to the 
mind. But the mind by volition can put these re- 
spective organs into act, into operation ; and they 
in return can perform its will. 

So also is it with regard to affirmation or denial : 



22 REMARKS ON THE 

they are no eloquent music discoursed by an ope- 
ration of the mind. The mind perceives or appre- 
hends ; it does no more. It perceives, or appre- 
hends, that a pen is in the hand, that a pen is not 
the hand ; it does no more — it can do no more. Nor 
is it necessary that it should. Language can do all 
that remains to be done ; but to this source philo- 
sophers have never looked. Certain effects were 
to be accounted for, certain acts or operations to be 
traced to their origin ; and they cast their eyes upon 
the power that rules every organ, by which the vo- 
luntary motions of our frame are performed, — ^the 
power that wills every action or operation, and to 
it assigned the various offices of its subordinate 
agents ; yet in no one instance, except this of pro- 
ducing articulate sounds, have they so done. 

Language, we repeat, can do all that remains to 
be done ; it can expressly pronounce that any two 
things agree or disagree ; it can affirm or deny, or in 
one word assert* their agreement or disagreement. 
^^Tiat share, it may be asked, has the mind in the 
performance of all this ? not a lip is opened, not a 
breath conformed into intelligible sound without its 
assenting power. Agreed ; the mind wills the ac- 
tion or operation of those organs, by which audible 
sounds, speech, language, are produced ; it directs 
and guides them, but the organs operate. Of these 
audible intelligible sounds, signs of thought, visible 
representatives, written characters, letters and com- 
binations of letters have in succession of time been 

* See WalliSj Institutio Logicse, L. 2, cap. 1. 



THKEE FIRST CHAPTERS. 23 

invented. But we never identify the act of wri- 
ting with an operation of the mind. 

To superficial enquirers all that has been here 
advanced will seem little better than a dispute of 
words. Verba obstrepunt.* But Dr. Whately is well 
aware that " Logic is entirely conversant about 
language, — that it is an indispensable instrument of 
all reasoning." It is indeed its province to teach 
the use of terms in general reasoning ; and if it has 
been shown, as I presume it has, that the founda- 
tions of our systems of logic are falsely laid, that 
they rest upon an abuse of words, an essential ser- 
vice has been rendered to the future logician, and 
smoothed his way to what Locke calls " a very dif- 
ferent sort of Logic and Critic" from any with 
which he has hitherto been made acquainted. 

There is another consideration which must not be 
omitted. The difference which has been enlarged 
upon, perhaps to an unnecessary extent, is one be- 
tween volitive and operative power — it marks a 
boundary, an hitherto, as far as my reading extends, 
undiscriminated boundary between mental power 
or faculty and the action of organized matter. And 
I press the establishment of this difference very 
earnestly upon those who participate in the appre- 
hensions of Professor Stewart with regard to " the 
tendency of some late philological speculations." 

This train of reasoning may be pursued and suc- 
cessfully applied to the observations of Mr. Smart. f 



* Bacon, Novum Organum, L. 1, § 59. 
f Manual of Logic, p. 255, 



24 REMARKS ON THE 

He urges it to be among the " egregious errors" 
of Home Tooke, that " he attributes every thing 
to language ; that he is a decided sensationalist^* 
who, admitting Locke's foundation, that our know- 
ledge begins with sensation, admits nothing except 
language, which is more than sensation ; and while 
he argues justly against Locke's doctrine of com- 
plex ideas, sees notliing beyond the instrumentality 
of language in all beyond sensation." 

But it has not occurred to Mr. Smart, that as- 
serting the instrumentality of language would be 
perfectly nugatory, unless powers or faculties in 
the mind to make use of that instrumentality were 
assumed and granted. ]\ir. Smart should also have 
inquired, what is this every thing that is attributed 
to language ? what purposes are to be effected by 
its instrumentality ? 

It has been shown, I think, that one purpose is 
that of affirming and denying. And a reference 
to the various modes and figures under which these 
operations of language are represented by logi- 
cians, will illustrate very fully and very clearly the 
uses for which it is adapted and to which it is ap- 
plied. 

Let us take the old and valuable " Logic" of 
Port Koyal, and the first Book of the Analytics of 
Aristotle, we shall find that the subject and predi- 
cate in the latter are expressed by letters ; in the 
former, by words. The purposes in both cases are 



* That Tooke himself had no respect for the master of this sect, 
Condillac, is plain enough. See Div. of Pur. Vol. 1, p. 389. 



THREE FIRST CHAPTERS. 25 

the same, and are answered as effectually by the 
one as by the other. Collections of ideas are com- 
pared in both ; the changes in the " modes and fi- 
gm-es" of the syllogism manifest the changes in 
which different collections of ideas may be pre- 
sented to the mind by a sign, whether that sign be 
a letter or a word. So also of any particular ideas 
of which any abstract or general term may be the 
sign. 

And thus, to adopt the expressions of the elo- 
quent historian, we may " severely reason with 
Aristotle ;" and escaping awhile from the rigid 
trammels of logic into those where the mind may 
find more ample room to expand itself, " we may 
sublimely speculate with Plato."* 



CHAP. IV. 

OF THE NOUN. 

THE 7ioun is defined to be " the simple or 
complex, the particular or general sign or 
name of one or 7nore ideas." 

And at this stage, an inquiry into the force of 
terms (which depends on the number of ideas of 
which any term is the sign) should commence ; but 
this branch Locke has preoccupied. And he, per- 
haps intending to confine himself to the considera- 
tion of the mind only^ did not advance to the man- 

* Gibbon. 



26 OF THE NOUN. 

ner of signification, to which that consideration 
could never lead him. 

Of the declension, number, case, and gender of 
nouns there is no painsworthy difficulty or dispute. 
In our lano'uao^e the names of tilings without sex, 
(figure apart) are also without gender; because 
with us the relation of words to each other is de- 
noted by the place or by prepositions ; which de- 
notation, in the Greek and Roman languages, made 
a part of the words themselves, and was shown by 
cases or terminations. 



CHAP. Y. 

THE AETICLE AND INTERJECTION. 

THEIR claims to the rank of parts of speech 
are next examined, and those of the latter 
are roughly rejected; the dominion of speech is 
erected on their downfall. 

The parts of speech, ex instituto non natura de- 
bent constare.* The cries of animals, signa tris- 
titiae, aut Isetiti^e, qualia in avibus, qualia in quad- 
rupedibus;* every involuntary convulsion with oral 
sound has almost as good a title to be called a 
part of speech as interjections have. " Voluntary 
interjections are only employed when the sudden- 
ness or vehemence of some affection or passion re- 
turns men to their natural state, and makes them 

* Sanctii Minerva, Lib. 1, c. 1. 



THE ARTICLE AND INTERJECTION. 27 

forget the use of speech ; or when, from some cir- 
cmnstance, the shortness of time will not permit 
them to exercise it."* 

The Article is declared to be a necessary^ 
instrument of speech; so necessary, that no lan- 
guage can do without it, or some equivalent in- 
ventio7i. Let this expression be remarked, — some 
equivalent invention; for it has been disregarded 
by various opponents of Home Tooke. 

The necessity of the article follows immediately 
from the necessity of general terms, and their ne- 
cessity is sufficiently proved by Locke. " The use 
of words," he observes, " being to stand as outward 
marks of our internal ideas ; and those ideas being 
taken from particular things, if every particular 
idea should have a distinct name, names would be 
endless." I " The far greatest part of words that 
make all languages, are general terms. ''^ § " General 
and universal belong not to the real existence of 
things, but concern only signs; signs of things, 
which are all of them particular in their existence : 
the general nature" (of those creatures of our own 
making — general ideas) " being nothing more but 



* Dr. Stoddart labours hard in behalf of interjections, and 
makes sad confusion between interjections, properly so-called, and 
verbal exclamations. 

t Scaliger, (de Causis, Chap. 131,) says that the Greek ar- 
ticle is superfluous ; for it may be supplied in Latin by is, or ille : 
these, if not called articles, are the equivalents. He also plainly 
shows that the Latin has an article in the pronouns qui and quis; 
the former being Kai 'o, and the latter Kat'og; and the Latin 
terminations us, a, xim, are the Greek article, 'Og, ?j, bv. 

X Essay, B. 2, c. 11, § 9. § Id. B. 3, c. 3. 



28 THE ARTICLE AND INTERJECTIONT. 

the capacity they are put into of signifying or re- 
presenting many particulars."* The generality of 
terms is reduced by the article, which thus ena- 
bles us to employ general terms for particulars ; so 
that the article in combination with a general term 
is merely a substitute (for a particular term) dif- 
ferent from the substitutes ranked under the gene- 
ral head of abbreviations, because it is necessary 
for the communication of our thoughts, and sup- 
plies the place of words which are not in the lan- 
guage ; whereas abbreviations are not necessary 
for communication, and supply the place of words 
which are in the language. 



CHAP. VI. 

OF THE WOED " THAT." 

THE word THATf appropriately foUows the 
article. The question started is, what is the 
conjunction that? the answer is, it is the same 
word, with one and the same signification as the 
article or pronoun. Unnoticed abbreviation in con- 
struction (which ought always to be carefully distin- 
guished from the manner of signification of words) 
and difference in position have caused this appear- 
ance of fluctuation, and misled the granunarians of 



* Essay, B. 3, c. 3, § 11. 

t The Chapter " Of the word that,'^ with the 7th, " Of conjunc- 
tions," and 8th, " Of English conjunctions," formed the subject of 
the Letter to Dunning. 



OF THE WORD " THAT." 29 

all languages, both ancient and modern ; for in all 
they make the same mistake. 

It seems expedient here to anticipate a little, and 
explain whence we have derived these two words, 
THE and THAT, and to add to them for the same 
purpose the so-called neuter pronoun, It, or, as an- 
ciently written, hit. The reader will thus be put 
into possession of a foretaste of the entertainment 
and instruction that await him. 

The English article the, is the imperative of 
the Anglo-Saxon the-an, to get, to take, assume ;* 
the Anglo-Saxon article se, is the imperative of the 
verb se-on, to see ; and that is the Anglo-Saxon 
thcet, that is, thead, theat, and means taken, as- 
sumed, the past participle of the same Anglo-Saxon 
verb. It or hit is the past participle of the An- 
glo-Saxon hcet-an, nominare, and means nominatum, 
the said. It and that are used plurally and singu- 
larly, and in the masculine and feminine, as well 
as neuter gender: they may be illustrated thus 
(as article or pronoun) : — 

The man that hath not music in himself is fit for 
treasons, stratagems and spoils, that is, take man, or 
see man : taken man hath not music, &c. ; said man, 
or taken man is fit for treasons, &;c. That is used 
in the plural by Sir Thomas More and others, 
" that days," " that angels." It is so used by 
Piers Plouhman, and in mascuKne and feminine 
by Chaucer and others. Custance says, " It am I, 



* Piers Plouhman and Chaucer both use the expression, " so 
thee ik," i. e. so get I ; so may I get, take, or (as Mr. Tyrwhitt) 
thrive. 



30 OF THE WORD " THAT." 

that is, I am she, your daughter." " Quod he; It 
am I, frend, that is, I am he, frend." 

It and that ahvays refer to some thing or 
things, person or persons, taken, assumed or spoken 
of before ; such only being the meaning of those 
two words. They may therefore well supply each 
other's place, as we say indifferently, and with the 
same meaning, of any action mentioned in discourse ; 
either, *^ It is a good action," or, " That is a good 
action," that is, " The said (action) is a good action;" 
or, " the assumed (action) is a good action;" or, 
" the action received in discourse is a good action." 

In replying to the question, what is the conjunc- 
tion that? — the Latin ut (or uti); the Greek 'on; 
the Latin (qu'otti, quodde) quod; the Greek /cat 
*oTTi, KOTTi (Latin que, from which the e was cut, 
as the ai in Greek), are produced to show that in 
those two languages the conjunctions ut and quod 
come within the same conditions as the Enghsh 
that* 

Thieves rise by night that they may cut men's 
throats. 

Ut jugulent homines surgunt de nocte latrones. 

Resolution. Thieves may cut men's tlu^oats ; (for) 
that (purpose) they rise by night. 

Latrones jugulent homines, (§i) 6ri surgunt de 
nocte. 



* So the French preposition car (anciently quhar), corresponding 
to our preposition /or, is qua re or que, (that is, Kai) ea re. (See 
Menage.) The reader will find by referring to the Port Royal 
Logic, Part 2, Ch. 1, and to their Grammar Supplement to Ch. 9, 
a remarkable coincidence with our author as to the French con- 
junction que. 



OF THE WORD ^' THAT." 31 

Dryden, writing to Walsh, says, " I find that 
you do not make a due distinction between that 
and who.'^'' 

Res. " You do not make a proper distinction 
between that and who." I find that (fact.)* 

I wish you to beKeve that I would not wilfully 
hurt a fly. 

Res. I would not wilfully hurt a fly ; I wish 
you to believe that (assertion). 

And here, as Tooke's general remarks on the in- 
terchange of letters will have particular applications 
in the succeeding pages, it is expedient to subjoin 
them. It is, moreover, but an act of justice that they 
should be put prominently forward, as they evidently 
lay the foundation for Grimm's Law ; and to this it 
may be added, that he was well aware of the value 
of what it is usual to call the " crude" form in ety- 
mological researches. Thus in tracing the Latin 
ros and mors to an Anglo-Saxon origin, he writes 
ror-is, ros ; mor^~is, mors. Qu in Latin was sounded 
not as the English, but as the French pronounce 
qu (that is as the Greek k) and it is thus he ac- 
counts for the change of /cat 'on into quod, so far 
as the k and q are concerned; and the perpetual 
change of t into d is familiar to all, and there is an 
organical cause for these and other changes ; of b 
into P ; V into r ; G into K ; z into S ; J into SH ; 



* Dryden's Works, Bell's Edition, 1853. Dry den proceeds to 
say, " A man, that — is not proper; the relative who is proper. 
That ought always to signify a thing; who, a person." Dryden 
may be supposed well acquainted with the grammatical usage of 
his day. 



32 OF THE WORD " THAT." 

and the Anglo-Saxon D, tliat is, th, as pronounced 
in that, into their 6, that is, th, as pronounced in 
thin^. The first of each pair (including D into t) 
differs from its partner " by no variation whatever 
of articulation, but simply by a certain unnoticed 
and almost imperceptible motion or compression of 
or near the larynx, which causes what Wilkins calls, 
" some kind of murmure." This compression the 
Welsh never use, as those acquainted with Sir 
Hugh Evans and the "/alorous gentleman" in 
Henry the Fifth, well know. 

Tooke illustrates the whole series of these or- 
ganic changes in a single line, in which his soreness 
to the quick as a politician is manifested. When 
a Welshman, instead of 

" I vow, by God, Dat Jenkin* iz a wizzard," 
pronounces it thus : 

" I fow, py Cot, to Shenkin iss a wissart ; " he 
articulates exactly as we dof ; but, failing in the 
compression, he changes seven of our consonants : 
to which compression we owe seven additional letters 
(that is, seven additional sounds in our language). 

The following changes are purely organic. 



Kobbed 


Robb'd 


Snapped 

Braced 

Pleased 


Snap't 

Bra9'd (c z= s) 

Pleas'd (szzz) 


Lapsed 
Amazed 


Laps't 
Amaz'd 



* By Jenkin was intended Jenkinson, the first Lord Liverpool. 
f i. e. uses the same organs of articulation. 



OF THE WORD 


" THAT." 


Girded 


Girt 


StufFed 


Stutf't 


Heaved 


Heav'd 


Eagged 


Eagg'd 


Cracked 


Crackt 


3 termination es 




Thinge^ 


Thingz 


Thinkes 


Thinks 


Leafes 


Leafs 


Leav-es 


Leaves 



33 



CHAP. VIL 

OF COXJUJS^CTIONS. 

TO proceed now to a survey of the remaining 
chapters of this voKnne, on the conjunctions, 
prepositions, and adverbs. 

It will be incumbent upon me not only to pre- 
sent a full detail of the etymologies proposed by 
our Author, but to state clearly and illustrate suf- 
ficiently his general principles ; and also, as an act 
of justice, to say a word on his claim to originality. 

I will dispose of the last, though in itself least 
important, topic, first. I believe that his claim re- 
mained undisputed from the year 1778 to 1790, 
when it was questioned by a writer who, under the 
signature of J. Cassander, addressed a letter to H. 
Tooke, Esq. containing " Criticisms on the Diver- 



34 OF CONJUNCTIONS. 

sions of Purley."* It may be safely affirmed, that 
if Tooke liad himself allowed this slight pamphlet 
to pass unnoticed, the pubhc would have done the 
same.f And it seems highly probable that Tooke 
would have permitted this to be the case, had he 
been able to resist the temptation which invited 
him to vent his acrimony against Mr. Windham, 
the then member for Norwich, in return for that 
gentleman's acrimony against Mmself.:]: Him the 
angry politician treats as the abettor, if not the co- 
adjutor, of Cassander in his attack : him he accuses 
of having assiduously and invidiously endeavoured 
to detract from his claim to originality, and to have 
very unjustly transferred that honour to Professor 
Schultens. That Schultens had not, and did not 
make any pretensions to the honour asserted in his 
behalf, — of teaching that all particles are nouns or 
verbs, — is very manifest from the entire passages, 
which are quoted from his work in the Diversions 
of Purley. He carefully adopts the qualifying ex- 
pressions used by grammarians, and especially by 
Latin grammarians long before he wrote, and many 
of whom Tooke had quoted for the purpose of re- 



* Ee7. J. Bruckner, of Norwich, who died 12th May, 1804. 
See Taylor's Edition of Diversions of Purley, p. 12. 

f One thing is clear, that Cassander so little understood the 
work he undertook to criticise, as to suppose, " that among the 
abbreviations employed for despatch," (Diversions of Purley, p. 45,) 
or, as he improperly terms them, words necessary (Criticisms, pp. 
7, 8, 25) for despatch, articles, prepositions, and conjunctions were 
comprised. 

J In a second edition of his first volume, published 1798, i. e. 
eight years after the offence was committed by Cassander. 



OF CONJUNCTIONS. 35 

commending by the partial authority of their par- 
tial hints and suspicions his own general doctrine. 

In 1818, six years after Tooke's death. Dr. Stod- 
dart* (now Sir John Stoddart) started a new candi- 
date for priority of discovery, — C. Koerber, who, 
so long ago as 1712, published at Jena a little vo- 
lume, called " Lexicon Particularum Ebraearum, 
vel potius nominum et verborum, vulgo pro parti- 
culis habitorum." Dr. Stoddart gives us very 
scanty information of the contents of this very rare 
volume,! certainly not sufficient to enable us to 
form a judgment as to the full extent of the prin- 
ciple upon which Koerber's Lexicon is constructed. 

The Author's tutor, Danzius, it appears, in the 
preface to the work taught " that most, if not all, the 
separate particles were in their own nature nouns ; '* 
that this was indeed " a new and unheard of hypo- 
thesis," but that on investigation, the reader would 
find reason to conclude universally (in respect to the 
Hebrew language at least) that all the separate par- 
ticles are either nouns or verbs. His own words 
(Dr. Stoddart adds) are these : " Particulae sepa- 
ratee si non omnes, certe plerceque sua natura sunt 
nomina." " Hanc thesin hactenus novam et inau- 
ditam," and again, " Omnes omnino Ebraeorum 
particulas separatas aut nomina esse aut verba." It 
is quite clear that Koerber piqued himself upon 
laying before the public a discovery, and it is but 
just that his title should be better known than it 

* See Encyclopsedia Metropolitana, V. 1, p, 19, and repeated 
in the Philosophy of Language, p. 43. 

f It is not in the Library of the British Museum. 



36 OF COXJ UNCTIONS. 

yet is, as far as that title extends ; for lie uses the 
limiting expression, " si non omnes, plerseque ;" 
nor does it appear that he reasoned on any general 
principles. Dr. Stoddart admits that Tooke very 
probably made (what he. Dr. S. calls) a honajide 
discovery, so far as re<2:arded his own reflections, 
though not one entirely new to the world.* 

What then was this discovery ? " Home Tooke's," 
says Sh* James Mackintosh, " is certainly a won- 
derful work; but the great merit is the original 
thought." What was this thought, so highly prized 
by one so able to appreciate its worth ? Tliat words 
are the signs of ideas (o-i»/ij3oXa TraOrjjuLaTwv), and 
that all are nouns significant (kql avfJiaivei ti), are 
positions that had long been acknowledged in the 
schools, and taught there upon the express autho- 
rity of Aristotle. As an undeniable consequence, 
Tooke inferred that those classes of words com- 
prized under the general head of particles Avere also 
nouns or verbs, and had of course a signification. 

The whole system is founded on general reason- 
ing. In the letter to Dmmingf he had pronounced 
that, " there is not, nor is it possible there should 
be, a word in anv language which has not a com- 



* Dr. Stoddart (Philosophy of Language, p. 43) has the merit 
of starting another candidate for ■priority of discovery, in the per- 
son of J. D. Van Lennep, whose work, De Analogia, was not 
published till the 3'ear 1790, i.e. twelve years after the letter to 
Dunning, and four after the 8vo. Edition of the 1st Pt. ofDiversions 
of Purley. Coleridge had previousl}^ asserted, " That aR that is 
good in Tooke's book is taken from Lennep." Lennep reasons 
on no principle, and limits his dictum to " omnia fere." (Len- 
nep, De Analogia, c. 3, p. 38.) 

t Page 23, note. 



OF CONJUNCTIONS. 37 

plete meaning and signification, even when taken 
by itself. Adjectives, prepositions, adverbs, &c. 
have all complete separate meanings, not difficult 
to be discovered." 

This Avas the grand principle, thus early em- 
braced and declared; and the subsequent thought 
then was, " that if this reasoning is well founded, 
there must be in the original language from which 
the English (and so of all other languages) is de- 
rived, such and such Avords bearing precisely such 
and such meanings."* And he was the more pleased 
with this suo^orestion, because he was iornorant of 
the characters even of the Anglo-Saxon and Gotliic 
languages ; and he had to learn those languages as 
a mean to ascertain whether he had made a disco- 
very ; and the event exceeded his expectation. 

It may be as well here to observe that he sub- 
sequently offers as a general rule, " That where 
different languages use the same particle, that 
language ought to be considered as its legitimate 
parent, in which the true meaning of the word can 
be found, and where its use is as common and fa- 
miliar as that of any other verbs or substantives."! 

I do not know that this rule has anywhere been 
directly questioned, but it is certainly in practice 
wholly disregarded, and etymologists still continue 
" by unnatural forced conceits to derive the Eng- 
lish and all other lano-uao-es from the Greek or 
the Hebrew, or some imaginary primaeval tongue." J 



* Diversions of Purley, 1, 125. 

t lb. V. 1, p. 300, note *. + To. 1, 147. 



38 OF CONJUNCTIONS. 

'' That word/' lie says in another place, "is always 
sufficiently original for me in that language where 
its meaning, which is the cause of the application, 
can be found."* 

Bearing these unportant preliminaries in mind, 
the reader is now prepared for our Author's chapters 
on those parts of speech, which (according to Mr. 
Harrisjf " appear in grammar, like zoc^ihytes in 
nature ; a kind of middle beings, of amphibious 
character, which, by sliaring the attributes of the 
higher and the lower, conduce to link the whole 
together." 

In the distribution of the parts of speech, the 
name of conjunction is given to words connecting 
sentences, and of preposition to those connecting 
words ; and the same word may (and it is not at all 
extraordinary that it should) be used both as con- 
junction and preposition, as it is the apparently dif- 
ferent application to single words or to sentences 
that constitutes the difference between them. And 
the distinction is useful on account of the cases 
which they govern when applied to words, and 
which they cannot govern when applied to sentences. 
Conjunctions are not in their nature a separate sort 
of word, or part of speech, by themselves ; they have 
not a separate manner of signification, although not 
devoid of signification. There is not one in any 
language, which may not, by a skilful herald, be 
traced home to its own family and origin. Ab- 
breviation and corruption are always busiest with 

* Diversions of Purley, Vol. 2, p. 204. f Hermes, B. 2, c. 2. 



OF CONJUNCTIONS. 



39 



the words which are most frequently in use; yet 
the words most frequently used are least liable to 
be laid aside. 

The conjunctions, then, may thus be reduced to 
one general scheme of explication ; though John- 
son declared it to be a task which no man, however 
learned or sagacious, had been able to perform. 



If ^ 




fGif ^ 




rGifan 


To give 


An 




Xn 


w 'S^nan 


To grant 


Unless 




Onles 


'S Onlesan 


To dismiss 


Eke 


> 


Eac 


> Eacan 


To add 


Yet 


"cl 


Get 


1 Getan 


To get 


Still 


1. 


Stell 


■^ Stellan 


To put 


Else 


>i< 


Xles )> Bh-<: 'S'lesan 


To dismiss 


Tho' or 
Though 


1 


Thaf or 
Thafig 


0) 


Thafian or ) 
Thafigan 5 


To allow 


But 


g 


Bot 


'B 


Botan 


To boot 


But 


eS 


Be-utan 


r4 


Beon-utan 


To be-out 


Without 




Wyrth-utan 


o 


Wyrthan-utan To be-out 


And J 




^Xn-ad J 




^Anan-ad 


Dare congeriem 



Lest is the past participle Lesed of Lesan, to 
dismiss : from Les (the imperative of the same verb) 
placed at the end of nouns and coalescing with 
them, we have such words as hopeless, fearless, &c. 

fSithan ^ 
I Syne j 

Since <! If^^^he^ Y ^^ ^^^ participle of Seon— To see. 
i or I 
L.Sin-es J 

That is the article or pronoun — That — As, is C5, 
a German article, meaning it, that, or which. So 
is sttf a Gothic article of the same import. 

Or is a contraction of the Saxon oder, other, 
something different, and often contrary. There are 
others, which it would be useless to explain. 



40 ETYMOLOGY OP 



CHAP. YIIL 

ETYMOLOGY OF ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 
Examples and Resolutions. 

IF and an may be used mutually and indiffer- 
ently to supply each other's place. 

Ir that the king 
Have any way your good deserts forgot. 
He bids you name your griefs. 

Hen. IV. P. 1, 4, 3. 
Res. The king hath your deserts forgot ; give or 
grant that ; he bids you name your griefs. 
Nay, an thou dalliest, then I am thy foe. 

Ford, Lover^s Melancholy, 3, 3. 
- Res. Give or grant, that thou dalliest, then, &c. 
If was variously written in old authors: gif, 
yeue, yef, yf. Gin, used in our northern counties, 
and in Scotland, is given, gien, gen; this being 
given, gien or gin. 

If (as and, unless, &c.) may be used both as 
conjunction and preposition. 

Ex. How will the weather dispose of j^ou to- 
morrow ? if it is fair weather, it will send me 
abroad ; zfit is foul, it will keep me at home. Here 
the datum is a sentence. It is fair weather ; Give 
{that understood), it will send, &;c. How will, &c. ; 
if fair (weather), it will send, &c. ; if foul, it will 



ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 41 

keep me at liome. Here the verb if (under the 
grammar name of preposition) governs the noun. 
In the former case (under the name of conjunction) 
if governed the sentence. 

Though, Altpiough. Though and if may 
very frequently supply each other's place. 

Ex. Though (that is, allow) all men should for- 
sake you, yet will not I. 

If (that is, give, grant) all men should, &c. ; the 
Scotch would say, suppose. 

Unless, Else, With-out, But, (Be-out,) 
Lest. Unless was written onlesse, onless, oneles, 
as late as the reign of Queen Elizabeth. 

Ex. No man commeth to me onlesse my father 
drawith him. Gardiner. 

Dismiss the fact that my father draweth him, no 
man cometh to me. 

Les or less, is used both by B. Jonson and Beau- 
mont and Fletcher. 

To tell you true, 'tis too good for you. 
Less you had grace to find it. 

J3e7i Jonson, Bartholomeic Fair. 

Unless, without, that is, he-out, might in this and 
the preceding example have been used with pro- 
priety. UNZe55, YiiTTLout and But, were used both 
as conjunctions and prepositions : without, now com- 
monly as preposition; hut and unless, as conjunc- 
tions. 

Ex. The commendation of adversaries is the 
greatest triumph of a writer; because it never 
comes unless extorted; otherwise, unless it (the 
commendation of adversaries) is extorted. In the 



42 ETYMOLOGY OF 

former case, unless is a prej)osition ; in the latter, 
conjunction.* See ante, ir. 

Ex. It cannot be read loithout the Attorney 
General consents to it. Lord Mansfield, 

It cannot be read without the consent of the 
Attorney General. 

Ex. And oon of them shal not falle on the erthe 
with outan youre fadir (sine patre vestro ; in Anglo- 
Saxon, butan eowran fseder). Wic. Mat. 10, 29. 

But is used constantly in old authors as a pre- 
position, equivalent to with-out ; it is still fre- 
quently used as a preposition ; as, all but one ; all 
but me are gone. And vnthout, though not now in 
approved usage, is frequently heard in common 
speech, where unless^ or an equivalent, would be 
deemed more correct. 

Lest, Least, are used by Gower and Bale as 
the regular past tense, contracted from lesed, leased. 

In an houre 
He lest (amisit) all that he mai laboure 
The long yere. Conf. Aman. B. 4, fo. 68. 

He (Becket) sore amended whan he was once 
consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury; and least 
(dimisit, he dismissed; he put away) his accustomed 
embracinges, and became in life religious. 

Actes of Religious Votaries. 

Ex. Watche, therefore, for ye knowe not when 
the master of the house wyll come; leste if he 
come sodenlye, he shoulde fynde you sleepynge. 
Mathews' Bib. Mark, c. 13. 

* Ohs. The Latin conjunction ni si, and preposition si ne, i. e. 
ne sit, sit ne, are the same word. 



ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 43 

Res. Watch, therefore, for, &c. (the act of 
watching being dismissed, or put away,) coming 
suddenly, he find you sleeping. 

Less, lest or least, always preserve the significa- 
tion of dismissing, separating, or taking away ; and, 
as the Latin minus, diminishing. 

Less or lesser, used comparatively, from which 
some is dismissed or taken away ; least, used su- 
perlatively, from which some more has been dis- 
missed or taken away.* 

Else is very variously written, alyse, alys, 
Gower and Chaucer write elles, els. 

Ex. You shall have a fool's cap for your pains, 
and nothing else. 

Res. You shall have a fool's cap for your pains, 
and nothing, unless. (But, be-out, except, if not,) 
dismiss a fool's cap. 

But. All animals have sense. 

But a dog is an animal. Therefore, &c. 
i. e. Add or superadd, a dog is an animal. 

And so in all such cases, where but introduces a 
minor premiss. 

The difference between but and biit, is estab- 
lished by an abundance of quotations ; an instance 
will be sufficient here. 

Ex. Bot thy werke shal endure in laude and 
glorie hut spot or fait. G. Douglas. 

Res. Add (or and) thy work shall endure in 
praise and glory, be-out or without spot or blemish. 

But may interchange with and. 

* See infra. Much. 



44 ETYMOLOGY OF 

Ex. But his disciples axiden liim, what his pa- 
rable was. Wic. Luke 8, 9. 

And his disciples axed him. Mathews, lb. 

But that that fel among thornes. Wic. Luke %, 
14. 

And that whiche fell amonge thornes. Mathews, 
lb. 

They have mouths, but they speak not ; 

Eyes have they, but they see not. 

Ps. 115, Bible version. 

They have mouths and speak not; eyes have 
they and see not. Lb. Common Prayer version. 

In the expression. But a moment, my lords, and 
I will show, &c. but is a preposition ; in. But in- 
dulge me with a moment, my lords, it is a conjunc- 
tion: or in the one case a verb, governing or 
affecting the noun ; and in the latter, a verb, go- 
verning or affecting the sentence. 

Eke. Ex. Waters he hath eke, good enow. 

R. Gloucester. 

Res. Add (or and) he hath waters good enough. 

Ex. At the siege eke hadde he be 

Of Algesir. Ch. Prol. 1. 5Q. 

Res. Add (to the places at which he had been) 
he had been at Algesir. 

Why should I not as well eke tell you all 

The purtraiture that was upon the wall. 

Id. Knight's Tale, 1. 1969. 

Add (to what I have already told) why should I 
not as well tell. 

Yet, Still. These may be mutually used for 
each other. 



ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 45 

Therfore Jesu seide to hem, 3zV a litil tyme I am 
with you. Wic. John 7, 33. 

Then Jesus said unto them, i/et a little while am 
I with you, and then I go unto him that sent me. 

lb. Modern versioii. 

Res. Yet a little while (or little while being got, 
obtained) I am with you, and then, &c. 

Still as you rise the state exalted to. 

Finds no distemper while 'tis raised by you. 

Waller. 

Still, put or place 1 ,, , . ^x ^ . o 

^^ '^, \ . Uhat you rise, the state, &c. 
Yet, get or obtam J "^ 

And. Ex. You and I and Peter rode to Lon- 
don.* 

Res. You rode ; add, I rode ; add, Peter rode. 

Ex. John a7id Jane are a handsome couple. 

Res. John add Jane are a handsome couple. 

In the first example, and governs the sentences 
I rode, Peter rode ; in the second it governs the 
noun- Jane, and is in the one case a conjunction, 
and in the other a preposition. 

It has ah'eady been said more than once, that 
various words usually classed as conjunctions and 
conjunctions only, do also perform the office of 
prepositions ; and is now added to the number. 
" And if," says Tooke, " this (grammatical) defini- 
tion of conjunction be adhered to, I am afraid that 
the grammarian will scarcely have an entire con- 
junction left ; for I apprehend that there is not one 



* In the Wiclif Bible, and is not unusually employed Avhere 
subsequent versions employ aUo. 



46 ETYMOLOGY OF 

of those words which they call conjunctions, which 
is not sometimes used (and that very properly) 
without connecting sentences." Yol. 1, p. 221. 

[If, as Sir J. Stoddart suggests,* we substitute 
the imperative add for the conjunction and, we get 
rid of the question, which is merely whether and 
is to be called conjunction or preposition ; and this 
depends entirely on the office it performs. 

Than is a conjunction not noticed by Tooke, 
but I introduce it because there is a grammatical 
difficulty with regard to it, which this rule, for so 
I now consider it, that the same word may be used 
with propriety both as a conjunction and a prepo- 
sition, will help to remove. 

Lowth maintains, that when the qualities of 
different things are compared, the latter noun is 
governed, not by the conjunction than or as, (for a 
conjunction has no government of cases,) but by the 
verb or the preposition, expressed or understood ; 
as, " thou art wiser than I (am) ; " " you love him 
more than (you love) me." Such forms of speech 
as " thou art wiser than ?7ie," he condemns as bad 
grammar ; and then, as is not unusual with him, he 
produces examples of the constant usage of such 
forms by Swift, Congreve, Prior, Atterbury, and 
Bolingbroke. It might be defended as an English 
idiom, but there is no occasion for any subterfuge 
at all. Than, in all the instances quoted, is a pre- 
position, performing its proper office, that of con- 
necting words ; and so it is, and nothing else, when 

* Philosophy of Language, Part 1 . 



ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 47 

followed by the objective case of tlie relative pro- 
noun, 

Beelzebub, than ichom 
Satan except, none higher sat. P. L, 2, 229. 

Dr. Latham, I am glad to see, at least seems in- 
clined to concur in this opinion: after quoting 
some such instances as those in Lowth, he says, 
" none of these expressions are correct ; or, if so, 
they are correct only under the idea that the word 
thaii is sometimes a conjunction (when it cannot 
govern a case), and sometimes a preposition (when 
it can govern a case)."* 

As, is a conjunction noticed, but not illustrated, 
by Tooke. 

Prior writes : 

The sun, upon the calmest sea, 
Appears not half so bright as thee. 

And this usage may be justified on the same 
grounds.] 

Since. This is so remarkable a word, that I 
must transcribe at length all that Tooke has so 
carefully written concerning it.t 

Since is a very corrupt abbreviation, confounding 
together different words and different combinations 
of words, and is, therefore, in modern English made 
(like but) to serve purposes which no one word in 
any other language can answer ; because the same 
accidental corruptions, arising from similarity of 



* Elementary English Grammar, § 375. See also his Hand- 
book, Ch. 26. 

f I transcribe from the Letter to Dunning ; for so early had 
he concluded his researches. 



48 ETYMOLOGY OF 

sounds have not happened in tlie correspondent 
words of any otlier language. 

Where we now employ since, was formerly (ac- 
cording to its respective signification) used : — 

Sometimes, 1. Seoththan, siothhan, seththan, 
siththan, siththen; sithen^ sithence, sithens, sithnes, 
sithns : 

Sometemes, 2. Syne^ sine, sene, sen, syn, sin: 

Sometimes, 3. Seand, seeing, seeing-that, seeing- 
as, sens, sense, sence : 

Sometimes, 4. Siththe, sithe, sith, seen-that, seen- 
as, sens, sense, sence. 

Accordingly, since, in modern English, is used 
four ways ; two as a preposition, connecting (or 
rather affecting) words ; and two, as a conjunction, 
affecting sentences. 

^Yhen used as a peeposition, it has always the 
signification either (1.) of the past participle seen 
joined to thence, (that is, seen and thenceforward) ; 
or (2.) else it has the signification of the past par- 
ticiple see Ji, only. 

When used as a con^junction, it has sometimes 
the signification of the present participle seeing, or 
seeing that ; and sometimes the signification of the 
past participle seen, or seen that. 

As a PREPOSiTiON^, 1. Since, (for siththan, si- 
thence, or seen and thenceforicard ;) as, 

" Such a system of government as the present 
has not been ventured on by any king siis^CE the 
expulsion of James the Second." 

2. Since (for syne, sene, or seen) ; as, 

" Did George the Third reign before or since 
that example ? " 



ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 49 

3. Since. As a conjunction, (for seand, seeing, 
seeing-as, seeing-that ;) as, 

" If I should labour for any other satisfaction 
tlian that of my own mind, it would be an effect of 
frenzy in me, not of hope ; since it is not truthy 
but opinion, that can travel the world without a 
passport." 

4. Since (for siththe, sith, seen-as, or seen-that;) 
as, 

" Since death in the end takes from all, what- 
soever fortune or force takes from any one ; it were 
a foolish madness in the shipwreck of worldly 
things, where all sinks but the sorrow, to save that." 

Since and sith, though now obsolete, continued 
in good use down even to the Stuarts, Hooker 
in his writings uses sithence, sith, seeing and since. 
The two former he always properly distinguishes ; 
using sithence for the true import of the Anglo- 
Saxon siththan; and sith for the true import of the 
Anglo-Saxon siththe: which is the more extraor- 
dinary, because authors of the first credit had very 
long before Hooker's time confounded them toge- 
ther, and thereby led the way for the present in- 
discriminate and corrupt use of since in all the 
four cases mentioned. 

Seeing, Hooker uses sometimes, perhaps (for it 
will admit of doubt) improperly: and since, (ac- 
cording to the corrupt custom which has univer- 
sally prevailed in the language,) he uses indifferently 
either for sithence, seen, seeing, or sith* 

* I refer the inquisitive reader to my English Dictionary, 
E 



50 ETYMOLOGY OF 

The article, pronoun or conjunction, that, it is 
remarked, generally makes a part of, and keeps 
company with, most of the other conjunctions, as, 
if that, an that, unless that, SiC. ; since that, save 
that. It exists also in sith, or sithe (Anglo-Saxon 
sith-the); the in the Anglo-Saxon meaning that. 
And since is also considered to be a corruption of 
seen-as, seeing as ; the as has been explained to be 
an article, written in German es, and to have the 
same meaning as it, that, ivhich, have : (otherwise, 
the same meaning that it, &c.)* 

£Js, in the old EngHsh al-es, als ; and so in also, 
both mean it, that. 

Al before es, was used in comparison before the 
first as or es, but not before the second : it is now 
dropt. Thus, 

Sche 

Glidis away under the fomy seis 

Als swift as Gan3e or f odder id arrow fleis. 

G. Douglas, p. 323, v. 46. 
In modern English, 

As swift as darts or feathered arrows fly. 

Res. 1. (With) «ZZ^/i«^ swiftness (with) t^A2cA,&c. 

2. (With) that swiftness (with) wliich, &c. 



where he will find quotations from Hooker exemplifying his usage 
of since, sithence, sithe, and seeing that. He will also find copious 
illustrations from the earliest times. I may add, that where 
Wiclif reads sithe, sithen, Mathews has se7i, sence. Sen, sin, or 
syne, is preserved in the common speech of our Northern Counties. 
The reader will do well also to refer to the Dictionary of Dr. 
Jamieson. 

* Other illustrations of this, and of als, also, are giren in my 
Dictionaries. 



ENGLISH CONJUNCTIONS. 51 

It is plain that many conjunctions may be used 
(with a little turn of the expression) almost indif- 
ferently for each other. 

Take this one instance : 

And soft he sighed, lest men might him hear; 
substitute, that men might not; or, else men might, 
&c. Or change the order ; thus, unless he sighed 
soft ; hut that he ; without he ; save that he ; except, 
outcept, outtake* he: or, again, if that, and an, set 
that, put case, be it, he sighed not soft, men might 
him hear. I 



* 1( out-take be a conjunction, why not take ? See infra, p. 73. 

f "Webster, after giving Tooke credit for the first explanation 
of certain indeclinable words called conjunctions and prepositions, 
adds, " I have made no use of his writings in this work." He 
has, however, done so, and very largely, to the great advantage 
of his work; with respect to these conjunctions most especially; 
and how he could go so far, and no farther, it is impossible to 
conjecture. 

Of lest, he says, it means loosing or separation ; and he resolves 
two sentences after the example of Tooke. 

If and eke he adopts ; unless, he derives with Tooke from on-les- 
an ; but else he consigns to the Latin alias. An, after referring 
to Greek, Arabic, &c. he allows may be probably an imperative, 
annan, or anan, to give. Yet may be from the root of the verb to 
get (which, he asserts, means primarily to throw; and then, as 
the primary explanation, we have, to procure). Still, means set, 
fixed (sc. time), and a passage from Addison is resolved accord- 
ingly. Though may be an imperative of a verb (Ir. daighim) mean- 
ing grant, admit, allow ,- but he does not name the Anglo-Saxon 
Thaf-ian. That, conjunction, he resolves after Tooke's examples. 
He acknowledges that there are two huts. 



52 



CHAP. IX. 

OF PREPOSITIONS. 

THE words used as prepositions, Mr. Harris 
unfortunately declares to have no significa- 
tion of their own, and yet to transfuse something of 
their own meaning (that is, of what they have not) 
into the words with which they are compounded.* 

Of different languages, the least corrupt will 
have the fewest; the nmnber depends on how 
many of the most common words have become 
obsolete or corrupted : and this being mere matter 
of particular fact and of accident, can have no place 
in general or philosophical grammar. 

Language is an art springing from the necessi- 
ties of artless men, who invented it to supply those 
necessities, not the device of philosophers sitting 
in council ; they took such and the same words as 
they employed on other occasions to mention the 



* Mr. Smart, if I understand him rightly, goes a step beyond 
this. He says, " J/" our theory is true, the words of a sentence 
understood in their separate capacity, do not constitute the 
meaning of the whole sentence, (i. e. are not parts of its whole 
meaning,) and therefore, as parts of a sentence, they are not by 
themselves significant." Might he not as well say, that the 
several numbers which together amount to a total number, do not 
constitute — are not parts of that total number; and that the 
figures representing such several numbers are not by themselves 
significant. Smart, Beginning of a New School of Metaphysics, 
p, 55. 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 53 

same real objects, for prepositions are the names of 
real objects. They, like conjunctions, are only- 
nouns or verbs, disguised by repeated corruptions. 
It is the same sort of corruption that has disguised 
both, and ignorance of their true origin has be- 
trayed grammarians and philosophers into the mys- 
terious and contradictory language which they have 
held concerning them. As the necessity of the 
article (or of some equivalent invention) follows 
from the impossibility of having in language a dis- 
tinct name or particular term for each particular 
individual idea ; so does the necessity of the prepo- 
sition (or of some equivalent invention) follow, from 
the impossibility of having in language a distinct 
complex term for each different collection of ideas 
which we may have occasion to put together in 
discourse. The addition or subtraction of any one 
idea to or from a collection, makes it a different 
collection ; and (if there were degrees of impossi- 
bility) it is still more impossible to use in language 
a different and distinct complex term for each dif- 
ferent and distinct collection of ideas, than it is to 
use a distinct particular term for each particular 
and individual idea. To supply, therefore, the 
place of the complex terms which are wanting in a 
language, is the preposition employed : by whose 
aid complex terms are prevented from being infi- 
nite or too numerous, and are used only for those 
collections of ideas which we have most frequently 
occasion to mention in discourse. And this end is 
obtained in the most simple manner in the world ; 
for having occasion to mention a collection of ideas 



54 OF PEEPOSITIONS. 

for wMch there is no single complex term in the 
language^ we either take that complex term which 
includes the greatest number^ though not «ZZ of the 
ideas we would communicate ; or else we take that 
complex term,* which includes all and the fewest 
ideas, more than those we would communicate; 
and then by the help of the preposition, we either 
make up the deficiency in the one case, or retrench 
the superfluity in the other. 

For instance, 1. A house with a party wall. 
2. A house without a roof. 

With (1.) is the imperative of withan, tojoiii; 
and sometimes (2.) of wyrthan, to he. The instance 
then stands thus : a house, join a party-wall ; a 
house be-out a roof; in the first, the complex term 
is deficient ; the preposition directs to add what is 
wanting: in the second, the complex term is re- 
dundant; the preposition directs to take away 
what is superfluous. 

Thorough. The French peculiar preposition 
chez, is the Italian casa or ca, (a house) ; and the 
English preposition thorough, is the Gothic sub- 
stantive dauro, or the Teutonic substantive thurah, 
and means doo?^, gate, passage ; and as the English 



* Locke calls such terms, names of complex ideas ; teaching, 
that without the name be first invented, we cannot have that par- 
ticular complex idea. " Though the killing of an old man," he 
says, " be as fit in nature to be united into one complex idea, as 
the killing of a man's father; yet there being no name standing 
for the one, as there is in the name of parricide, to mark the other, 
it is not taken for a particular complex idea, nor a distinct species 
of action from that of killing a young man or any other man." 
B. 2, c, 22, § 4. "We might then easily add to our stock of complex 
ideas of killing, by the coinage of such words as senicide^ &c. 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 55 

preposition is very variously written, from its sub- 
stantive, so are* also the Gothic, Anglo-Saxon, 
Dutch, German and Teutonic prepositions from 
the substantives in their respective languages : 
Gothic dauro, Anglo-Saxon dor a, Dutch deure, 
German thure, Teutonic thurah, dure. In the 
Greek (which the Gothic in many particulars re- 
sembles) it is Qvpa ; and both the Persian (which 
in many particulars resembles the Teutonic) and 
the Chaldean use thu, for door. It is worthy of 
remark, that in the Teutonic, thurah is used both 
as preposition and substantive ; in the Dutch, door 
is used for both; in Anglo-Saxon, door is either 
6?ure or f/mre; in modern German, thuv is 6?oor, 
and church is ^Aorough. And this difference pre- 
vails between the German and the English, thus : 
German, ^Zistil and dovn; English, ^Aistle and 
thovn. German, ^Aeur, ifAaler, ^Aeil ; English, i/ear, 
c?ollar, 6?eal. 

Mr. Harris supplies an instance which will ex- 
emplify the identity of our substantive door, and 
our preposition thorough, thurg, thro\'\ 

Ex. The splendid sun, loith his beams genially 
warmeth thro'' the air the fertile earth. 

Res. The splendid sun, Jom his beams, genially 
warmeth passage the air (or the air being the pas- 
sage or medium) the fertile earth. 

[Wachter says of the German preposition durch, 



* Through indicat medinm ,• et proprie quidem medium locale ; 
sed et etiam medium physicura et morale. Wallis, Gram. p. 85. 

f The Greek has the same contraction ovprj^pa, the urethra, 
or urine passage, from ovpov and ^vpa. 



56 OF PEEPOSITIONS. 

^' Dicitur de transitu per locum in omnibus dialec- 
ticis;" and Johnson's second explanation is, " no- 
ting passage;" an explanation equally applicable to 
Ms other three.] 

From is the Anglo-Saxon and Gothic noun 
Jrum, heginning, origin, source, fountain, author.* 
Ex. Figs came FROM Turkey. 

Lamp/«Z/5 FROM ceiling. 
Lamp hangs FROM ceiling. 
This example is from Harris, who ascribes to 
from three diiferent relations : first, that of being 
detached from body ; a second, of motion ; and a 
third, of rest: the two last contradictory to each 
other. Tooke thus solves the difficulty involved 
in this asserted contradictoriness of meaning : 
Came, is a complex term for one species of motion. 
Falls, for another species of motion. 
Hangs, for a species of attachment. 
We have not complex terms to express the be- 
ginning of these motions and this attachment, and 
the place where they begin ; and we add, therefore, 
the signs of those ideas, "vdz. the word heginning 
(always the same) and the name of the place per- 
petually varying. Thus : 

Figs came 1 f Turkey 

Lamps fall ^ Beginning \ Ceiling 
Lamp hangs J [Ceiling. 

That is 
Turkey 1 fto come 

Ceiling [> the place of beginning < to fall 
Ceiling J [to hang. 

* From innuit terminum a quo. Wallis' Gram. p. 84. 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 57 

From relates to every thing to whicli beginning 
relates ; and therefore to time as well as to motion, 
without which there can be no time. 

Ex, From morn till night th' eternal larum rings. 

The larum rang, beginning morning ; or morn- 
ing being the time of its beginning to ring. In 
Mr. Harris's example it is plain the characters of 
detachment, motion and rest, belong to the words 
came and fall, and not to the word jfrom. 

[It cannot be insisted upon too strongly that in 
their interpretation of words, Lexicographers, fol- 
lowing the same course with Harris, transfer to the 
word they are explaining the signification of some 
other word in the sentence ; and this they do, not 
only in the case of prepositions, but of every other 
part of speech. 

Johnson has seventy interpretations of this pre- 
position ; the two first stand opposed to each other. 
1. Privation. 2. Reception; and the words in the 
sentences are : 1. Take, dreiv from; 2. Heceive from. 
Afterwards we have. Out of, noting emission. 
Th' Eternal Father jfrom his secret cloud 
Amidst, in thunder lettered thus his voice. 

The emission is expressed by the verb uttered; 
and the beginning, whence the utterance or emission 
came, was the midst of the cloud. 

10. Out of; noting extraction. 

From high Maeonia's shores I came. 
Of poor descent. 

The extraction is expressed by, or rather implied 
from, the verb came, connected with, of poor de- 
scent ; and the beginning of it was, the shores of 
Maeonia. 



58 or PREPOSITIONS. 

12. Out of; noting tlie ground, or cause of any- 
thing. 

'Tis true, from force the strongest title springs ; 

I therefore holdyrom that which first made kings. 

The ground or cause is expressed by the sub- 
stantive ^brce; and the beginning, whence the title 
springs, was /brce; and is expressed hj from.'] 

To. " The preposition to (in Dutch, written toe 
and tot, a little nearer to the original) is the Gothic 
taui or tauhts, that is, act, effect, result, consumma- 
tion ; which Gothic substantive is, indeed, in itself 
no other than the past participle tauid, of the verb 
taujan, agere ; and what is done, is terminated, 
ended, finished.'''^ To ^' has not perhaps (for I am 
not sure that it has not) precisely the signification 
of end or termination, but of something tantamount 
or equivalent."* 

" In the Teutonic the verb is written tuan or tuon, 
whence the modern German thun ; and its preposi- 
tion (varying like its verb) tu. In the Anglo-Saxon 
the verb is teog-an, and the preposition TO. The 
Latin preposition ad, to, is also merely the past 
participle of agere ; and that past participle is like 
wise a Latin substantive." 

Agitum, agtum, agdum, agd, ad 

or or or 

actum, act, at. 

To return to Mr. Harris's instances : 

These figs cameyrom Turkey to England. 



^ 



• To vel unto, innuit terminura ad quern, atque idem terminum 
relationis. Wallis' Gram. p. 84. 



OF PKEPOSITIONS. 59 

The lamp falls /rom tlie ceiling to the ground. 

The lamp hangs /rom the ceiling to the floor. 

As>from denotes the commencement of the mo- 
tion, so does to the end or termination ; which is, 
England, or ground, or floor. In 

From morn to night th' eternal larum rings — 
From is 023posed to to, and if we read, from morn 
till night, it is still so opposed; till being com- 
pounded of to and while, that is, time. From morn 
to time night.* 

Foe. As from and to are as opposite as hegin- 
ning and end ; so are for and of as cause and conse- 
quence. 

Foe, I believe (says Tooke) to be no other than 
the Gothic substantive yazVzw«, cause, f 

He imagines, also, that of (in the Gothic and 
Anglo-Saxon af or of) is a fragment of the Gothic 
and Anglo-Saxon afar a, posteritas, &c. ; of or a, 
proles, &c. ; that it is a noun substantive, and 

* Common people say, I will stay while evening. Till is, in 
our older writers, applied to fluce as well as time : as, he fled till 
Ireland ; they go till Athens 5 and it is still in use in the north of 
England in that sense. See Richardson's Dictionary. 

f For innuit finem cui, vel pro quo. Wallis' Gram. p. 84. 

Sir John Stoddart thinks it most extraordinary, that Tooke, 
who asserts universally that prepositions are the names of real 
objects, should say of the preposition for, " I believe it to be no 
other than the Gothic substantive /a i//na, cause." What real 
object is cause 1 How is causation to be apprehended by sense ? 
That we have a conception of cause is certain ; but it is equally 
certain that we come at it by means of our mind, and that it is in 
truth " a pwre idea oi intellect, ^^ which sense alone never did and 
never can give." Philosophy of Language, p. 174. Surely it is 
nothing extraordinary that Tooke should be consistent. He con- 
signed all " pure ideas of intellect " to the same limbo with Locke's 
Triangle, and Crambe's Lord Mayor. See infra, On Abstraction. 



60 OF PREPOSITIONS. 

means always consequence, offspring, successor, fol- 
lower, &c. 

It is remarked tliat the Russian patronymic ter- 
mination was of; now Vitch, that is, Jitz, fils, or 
films ; that of the English, son ; as in Peterhof, 
Petervitch, or Petrowitz, Peterson. Fitz is also 
a common patronymic prefix in English. In the 
Welsh ap, son, coalesces with many names, as in 
Ap, Rhys, Price, ^jt?-Howel, Powel. * Johnson has 
forty-six meanings of the preposition for, and two 
hundred instances in proof of them. Greenwood 
has eighteen meanings with above forty instances. 
A single instance is selected from each of these, and 
explained by our author ; in which cause takes the 
place oi for, and a slight change is made in the 
form of expression. Greenwood's general expla- 
nation is : I " The preposition for has many sig- 
nifications, and denotes chiefly for what purpose, 
end, or use ; or for whose benefit or damage any 
thing is done : as, ^ Christ died/br us.' " 

Res. Christ died cause us ; or we being the cause 
of his dying. 

He then subdivides this general explanation into 
eighteen specific ones. 

1. It serves to denote the end or object which 
one proposes in any action ; as, to fight for the 
public good (that is, cause the public good ; or, the 
public good being the cause of fighting). 



* De Brosses. Mech. du Langage, Cli. 12, § 5, observes that 
the Latin termination ius, in proper names (CEmiliMs), is very 
probably from the Greek vioq, filius. 

f English Gram. p. 95. 



^!W 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 61 

To proceed more briefly : 

2. He does all things for the love of virtue. 
Greenwood includes cause in his explanation. 

3. It marks the use for which a thing is done : 
as, Chelsea Hospital was builtybr disabled soldiers; 
disabled soldiers (or the use of disabled soldiers) 
being the cause of its being built. 

4. It denotes profit, advantage, interest: as, I 
write ybr your satisfaction. 

5. It denotes for what a thing is proper or not : 
as. It is a good remedy /or (the cure of) a fever. 

6. It denotes agreement or help : as. The soldier 
fights /br the king. 

There can be no difficulty in explaining these 
examples. Others there are, which require to be 
stated more at length. 

8. It denotes retribution, or requital and pay- 
ment : hither we refer the phrases. Eye for eye, 
&c. (that is, an eye destroyed by malicious violence 
being the cause of an eye taken from the convict 
in punishment). 

,11. It denotes the condition of persons, things, 
and times : as. He was a learned man for those 
times (that is, the darkness or ignorance of those 
times being the cause why he may be considered 
as a learned man). 

I hope the number of examples that have been 
presented to the reader, will suffice to enable him 
to put the remainder of Greenwood's, and the 
whole of Johnson's, to a fair trial. 

Dr. Lowth conceiving FOE, in its primary sense, 
to be loco alterius, in the stead or place of another, 



62 OF PREPOSITIONS. 

censures our two greatest masters of the Englisli 

language. — Dryden, for saying. You accuse Ovid 

for luxuriancy of verse ; and Swift, for saying. 

Accused the ministers /b?- betraying the Dutch. 

The meaning of the passages plainly is, 

Betrayino' the Dutchi ^ ^ , 

T -^ . ^ f, > Cause 01 the accusation. 

ijuxuriancy oi verse J 

Both Greenwood and Johnson give. Instead of, 
in the place of, as one of their explanations: I 
subjoin them with the example from each, with 
Tooke's explanation. 

Greenwood. It is used to denote instead of, 
in the place of; as, I wiU grind /br him (that is, 
he being the cause of my grinding). 

Johnson. In the place of, instead of: as. To 
make him copious is to alter his character ; and to 
translate him line for line is impossible (that is, line 
cause of line : or each line of the original beino^ the 
cause of each line in the translation). 

[It may be worth while to produce some old 
usages of the expression ^or to, now deemed a vul- 



And led hir unto France, spoused /()r to be. 

R. Brunne. 
What wenten ye out for to se. Wiclif. 
For he was late ycome fro his viage. 
And went ybr to don his pilgrimage. Chaucer. 
To be spoused, cause of her being led to France. 
To see what, was the cause that ye wenten out. 
To do his pilgrimage, the cause he went.] 
But/br and ofdiiFering so widely as cause and 
consequence, it remains to account for the indifferent 



n 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 63 

use of them in the following passage from Wych- 
erley's Country Wife : 

Well! 'tis e'en so; I have caught the London 
disease they call Love. I am sick of my husband, 
andybr my gallant. 

So also we have, sick of hunger ; sick for hun- 
ger ; sickness of hunger ; sickness for hunger. 

Here are, sickness o/"love; sickness /br love. 

Between the respective terms, — sickness, hunger 
— sickness, love, — it matters not w^hich of the two 
prepositions is inserted ; the only difference is, that 
if of be inserted, it is put in apposition to sickness , 
and sickness is announced as the consequence ; \ifor 
is inserted, it is put in apposition to hunger or to 
love, and hunger or love is announced the cause. 

Scaliger, in his Chap.* entitled Appositio, says 
truly, " Causa propter quam duo suhstantiva non 
ponuntur sine copula, e philosophia petenda est. — 
Si qua substantia ejusmodi est, ut ex ea et alia, unum 
intelligi queat ; earum duarum substantiarum toti- 
dem notae (id est nomina^ in oratione sine injunc- 
tione cohgerere poterunt." 

" And this," says Tooke, " is the case with all 
those prepositions (as they are called) which are 
really substantives. Each of these ejusmodi est, ut 
ex ea et alia (to which it is jorefixed, joosrfixed, or 
by any manner attached) unum intelligi potest." 

In illustration of this doctrine of Apposition, it 
is important to add, that " the Dutch are supposed 
to use van in two meanings, because it supplies in- 

* Cap. 127, De Causis, L. L. 



64 OF PREPOSITIONSi 

differently the places both of our of and from ; not- 
withstanding which, van has always one and the 
same meaning: namely, heginnirig. And its use, 
both for of and from, is to be explained by its dif- 
ferent apposition. When it supplies the place of 
FROM, van is put in apposition to the same term to 
which, from is put in apposition. But when it sup- 
plies the place of of, it is not put in apposition to 
the same term to which of is put in apposition, but 
to its correlative. And between two correlatives, 
it is totally indifferent to the meaning which of 
the two correlations is expressed.* 

£Jx, Comen van Amsterdam. 

To come from Amsterdam. 

Motion and place are the correlations ; van and 
from are in apposition to the place where motion 
began. 

£x. Hy is van goed geslacht. 
He is of a noble stock. 

Van is in apposition to noble stock ; (one corre- 
lative ;) the beginning, whence, he is (what he is) 
begins. 

But OF is in apposition to he is, (the other corre- 
lative,) as consequence or offspring of noble stock. 

Of. It is now necessary to return to the pre- 
position of, and first, as to its etymology. 

* It is worthy of note, that Sir John Stoddart quotes this with 
approbation, which shows that he understood and embraced 
Tooke's Doctrine of the effect of apposition and also of correla- 
tion. And yet in the last sentence of his elaborate Chapter on 
Prepositions, seems to insinuate that Tooke knew as little of the 
nature of a preposition, as those whom he censures for their igno- 
rance of it. 



OF PEEPOSITIONS. 65 

" Af, from rtf-ara or q/*-ora," (says a critic in the 
Quarterly Review, September, 1835, and an Alter 
idem probably in Blackwood's Magazine, April, 
1840,) " no more than the Latin post from the 
English, posterity.'''' He would have been nearer 
the chance of a truth, if he had said, " As much as 
the Latin po5jf, from. positum." He proceeds to as- 
sert that the Gothic noun ofar, is from the par- 
ticle afar, post, and this evidently from af. What 
then is af? It is Sanscrit apa, Greek dwo, Latin 
ab, Old German aba, apa, English of. And thus 
we are driven back to the old scheme of etymo- 
logy, deducing a noun from a particle, and leading 
us through a variety of synonymous affinities, and 
ending in, " True no meaning — puzzling more than 
wit." Tooke's doctrine required that he should 
look into our own language or its immediate parent 
for some noun substantive from which the prepo- 
sition, that is, the prepositive or rather appositive 
noun, might have derived to us. And he says, he 
imagines the Gothic afara to be that substantive. 
The corruption is slight, and the meaning clear. 

A few instances selected from Johnson will serve 
to illustrate this meaning, and at the same time to 
show further his practice (or rather the general 
practice) of imputing, as a meaning to the word he 
has to explain, a meaning that pertains to some 
other word in the sentence. 

9. Noting power, ability, choice. 

Some soils put forth odorate flowers of them- 
selves. — Odorate flowers are the consequence or 
offspring ; soils, the cause. 
F 



66 OF PREPOSITIONS. 

10. !N^oting properties, qualities, or conditions. 
" Its (the eglantine's) odours were of power to 

raise from death." That is, the odours of the eg- 
lantine were odours of power to raise from death. 
In the first case, odours were consequence and eg- 
lantine cause. In the second, odours (their being 
such odours as they loere) the consequence, and the 
power to raise from death the cause (of their being 
such), 

11. He was a man of ancient family. 

A man; consequence or oiFspring; — ancient fa- 
mily ; cause, source. 

13. Noting the matter of the thing. 

The chariot Avas of cedar, and borders of gold, 
&c. &c. need no explanation. 

By is the next important word : it is written hi 
or he. By cause, Z'z-cause, he cause, hy right, hi 
right, he right (in Anglo-Saxon hi, he, hig). It is 
the imperfect Byth of the Anglo-Saxon Be-on, to 
he.* It Infrequently used with an abbreviation of 
construction, or sub-audition of instrument, cause, 
agent, &c. and the meaning of the omitted word is 
often attributed to it. With, the imperative of 
icyrthan, is used indifferently for hy (when the im- 
perative of heoii), and with the same sub-audition 
and unplied meaning, f By was also used (not im- 
properly and with the same meaning) where now 
are used/br, in, during, through. One quotation 

* Hence hy-an^ to continue to be, to dwell. 

f Yet custom has established a difference in the usage. Though 
we say, " he was slain hy a sword or with a sword," we should 
not say, " he was slain with me by a sword," but " 63/ me with a 



OF PKEPOSITIONS. 67 

from the old cliromcler Fabyan will exemplify these 
usages. 

" ^VTien he (the holy Byshop Aldelme) was 
styred hy his gostly enymy to the synne of the flesh, 
he, to do more torment to himselfe and of hy s Body, 
wolde holde witliin his bed hy hym a faire may den 
hy so long a tyme as he myght say over a holy 
sauter." Fahyan, Ixxvi. 

By his gostly enymy (his ghostly enemy heing 
so. the agent). 

Wolde holde hy hym. Hym heing the cause of 
holding. 

Wolde holde hy so long a time ; so long a time 
heing, continuing, during. He might have written 
for so long a time as ; so long a time as to perform 
a certain act, being the cause of his so holding her. 
He might also have Avritten through so long a time ; 
so long a time heing the passage or medium to the 
performance of the act. 

" Sleynge the people without mercy hy all the 
wayes that they passed." Fahyan, Ixxviii. 

In all the ways, &c. 

Johnson in his four first explanations accords 
very well with Tooke : in the subsequent twenty, 
a meaning implied from some other word in each 
quotation is introduced. 



sword," hy being connected with the agent^ and with connected 
with the instrument. Again we may say. 

He was killed by {agent) me. 

He was killed by ov with {instrument) a sword. 

He was killed by or with {cause or means) sensual indulgences. 

Witlt, seems never to be connected with the principal agent. 



68 OF PEEPOSITIONS. 

5. It shows tlie manner of an action. ^^ Seize 
her by force. ''^ 

7. The quantity. " Sell hy the ounce^ 

8. Place. " Battle hy sea." 

12. Noting ground of judgment. " Judge the 
event hy what has passed." 

It is clear that in these instances ybrce expresses 
the manner; ounce, the quantity; sea, theplace; and 
what has passed, the ground of judgment. 

Sans, formerly, sometimes used instead of with- 
out, is a substantive, and means absence (Italian As- 
senza). It is from the Itahan preposition senza. 

So the Greek preposition y^ojpig, asunder, is the 
corrupted imperative of ^wpi^£iv,to sunder, to sever, 
disjoin, separate. 

The German preposition sonder, Dutch zonder, 
are the imperative of the respective verbs sondern, 
zonderen, with the same meaning as the Greek ^w- 

The Latin preposition sine, that is, sit ne, be not. 
The Spanish siyi, from the Latin sine. 

FuETHEE. The Greek %^a became the Doric 
^opa,and the Latinyb?'a,whenceybre5,ybn5, whence 
the ltdulmiLifuo?'a,fuore,fuori, and the Yrenchfors, 
which in the prepositive and conjunctive state, the 
French have latterly changed to hors ; but they 
have not so changed it when in composition, as 
forshourg. From the French we still have, and 
once had many more English words preceded by 
for in this meaning, asybrfeit,/b?Tclose, &c. 

[Our law-writers (I may remark) were quite 
aware of this origin of for ; they TQudiQY forfeit by 



OF PKEPOSITIONS. 69 

foris-facere, q. extraneum facere.* To these two 
I will add a few in very common u^q, forbear , for- 
bid, forget, forgive, forsake. 

FoR-BEAE, V. to abstain, says Mr. Tyrwhitt, that 
is, to hold or keep away from ; and so to forbear is 
forth-hQ2iY, that is, to bear forth or away from, to 
hold off or away. 

FOR-BID, V. to hidi forth or away from; sc. any 
thino* doinff or to be done. 

Forget, v. to get forth; to cause or suffer to 
get or go forth, pass out, or escape ; sc. from the 
mind or memory. 

Forgive, v. to give forth, out or away ; to remit 
or release, and consequentially, to pardon (^per do- 
nare). 

Forlore, E-obert of Gloucester writes Yer- 
LORE. Chaucer, Gower, Spenser write forlore, 
which Tyrwhitt properly interprets, utterly lost. 
YLoncQ forlorn, which Latham interprets lost only, 
omitting the force of for. 

Forsake, v. to seek forth, out or away from ; 
and thus, to go away or depart from. 

There is another old law term, which will serve 
for further illustration : 

FORIS-FAMILIATE, V. in Law JjSitin f oris fami- 
liare, to put, drive, or expel {f oris familiani) forth 
from hisfamilg. A son is said to he foris familiate 
(foris familiatus) when he has received from his 

• To do or cause to be out or away from, to do amiss or misdo. 
Chaucer writes : " All this suffred our Lord Jesu Crist, who 
never /orfaited." Parsones Tale. 

And also, to do away or lose his property, sc. for some crime. 



70 OF PEEPOSITIOKS. 

father a share or portion of the inheritance, and is 
to expect no more. Spelman.'] 

Betweej^. Betivixt, between, (formerly written 
twene, atwene, hytwene^ is a dual preposition, having 
no word correspondent in the Greek, Latin, Italian, 
French, &c. and being almost peculiar to ourselves. 
Between is the Anglo-Saxon imperative he and tweg- 
€71, twain. Betwixt is the same imperative, and the 
Gothic tioos or two. It is written by Chaucer by- 
twyt. 

^^-fore, ^i^-hind, BE-Iow, BiE-side can require 
no explanation. 

Be-keath. Neath, now obsolete, has left nether, 
nethermost in common use. The House of Com- 
mons was anciently (in the time of Henry YIII.) 
called the nether house of Parliament : and the word 
occurs several times seriously used in Paradise Lost, 
though now used otherwise. The Gothic nadr, 
Anglo- Saxon nedre, applied to the whole serpentine 
class, is much more ancient in the northern lan- 
guages than the introduction of astronomy among 
them, and with that their word nadir. The Anglo- 
Saxon neothan, neothe, (in Dutch neden, Danish 
ned, German niedere, and the Swedish nedre and 
neder,) is as much a substantive, and has the same 
meaning as this nadir. 

From the top to the bottom is in the collateral 
Dutch, " Van bovan tot beneden^ and in both the 
nouns are at once acknowledged. 

Undek, in Dutch onder, is on neder, though by 
the sound seeming to have so little connection with 
beneath. 



OF PREPOSITIOIirS. 71 

Beyond^ (in Anglo-Saxon not only bi^eond, be- 
geond^ but with^eond,^ is be and geond, the past par- 
ticiple of the verb Gan^ gan^an, or gongan, to go^ 
to pass. So that " beyond any place," means be 
passed that place, or be that place passed. 

[ Obs. Yon, Yondee, Ben Jonson classes among 
the pronouns.] 

Ward, in Anglo-Saxon ward or iceard^ is the 
imperative of wardian or weardian, to look at, to 
direct the view, and is the same word as the French 
garder. Our word reward, usually by help of other 
words in the sentence, conveys to recompense, to 
benefit, for some good action done ; and by the same 
help it conveys the notion of punishment, but is no 
other than the French regarder, to regard, to look 
again, that is, to re-member, to re-consider, the natu- 
ral consequence of which will be either the appor- 
tionment of benefit or the contrary, according to 
the action or conduct reviewed. 

It is in a figurative or secondary sense that garder 
means to protect, to keep, to watch, to ward, to 
guard. It is the same in Latin : Tutus, guarded, 
looked after, safe, is the past participle of tueor, tui- 
tus, tutus. So tutor, he who looks after. So we 
say either guard him well, or look well after him. 
And a looker, a warden, a warder, an overseer, a 
keeper, a guard or a guardian, is a name for the 
same agent or officer. 

Ward may be joined to any place, person, or 
thing, as in our old poets and divines, to Bome- 
ward, to G^odward, to (jY2iQ,e,iuard. 

In totoard and fromward we direct to look at or 



72 OF PREPOSITIONS. 

regard either the end or beginning of any action 
or motion or time. Ward always in composition 
retains the same meaning, namely, regard, look at, 
see, direct your view. 

The Latin preposition versus, (French vers, Ita- 
lian verso,) from the Latin verb vertere, to turn, is 
equivalent to the English ward, as ad-versus is to 
toward; it is versus, the past participle, turned, 
namely, in order to look at, to regard. 

Athwart, that is, athweort or athweoried, wrest- 
ed, twisted, curved, is the past participle of thweo- 
rian, to wrest, to twist. Thwart or athwart has 
corresponding prepositions in German, Dutch, Da- 
nish and Swedish, and from the same source are 
the English swerve and veer. 

Among. Emonge, Amonge, Amonges, 
Amongest, Amongst, Among, is the past parti- 
ciple gemoencged, gemencged (the Dutch gemengd, 
gemengt. Old English meynt*), of the Anglo-Saxon 
verb gemoRucgan, and the Gothic verb tamainga.n ; 
or rather the ipveterperf ect,gemang,gemong,gemung, 
or amang, among, amung, (of the same verb wcew- 
gan, mengan,) used as a participle, without the ter- 
mination od, ad, or ed, and meaning mixed, mingled. 
The Anglo-Saxons usually prefixed X. JE. be. for, 
ge. especially to their past participles. 

Ymell, with the same omission of termination, 
means y-medled, that is, mixed, mingled. Medley 
is still common. To medle, mydle, mell, merely to 
mix, are as common in old writers. 

• See infra. Many. 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 73 

Against. Mr. Tooke knows not the verb, of 
which this must be the past participle. 

Amid or Amidst. The Anglo-Saxon is On- 
middan, on-midder, in medio : Mid, middle (that is, 
mid-dael) midst. 

Along. On long or on length ; the Anglo-Sax- 
ons used Andlang or Endlong. 

Along. (It was along of you). The Anglo- 
Saxons used Gelang, the past participle of len3ian, 
and means produced. Our most ancient writers 
observed the same distinction.* 

It is along of you ; it is produced by you ; " I 
long for his return." We express a moderate de- 
sire for any thirig by saying we incline, that is, bend 
ourselves to it ; and an eager desire by saying that 
we long for it, that is, make long, lengthen, or stretch 
ourselves out after it or for it : observe, we say, 
inchne to or towards. Long for or after, 

Len^ian is also written lan^ian, and " Lan^^ath 
the awuht, Adam, up to Gode," Lye renders ; (est 
quod) elevabit te aliquid, Adam, sursum ad Deum : 
and Tooke, " longeth you, lengtheneth. you, stretch- 
eth you up to God." 

During is the participle of the verb dure, for- 
merly common in our language. Pending, op- 
posite, need no explanation. 

* Belong, Y. on the meaning of the verb lenzian, to long, thsit is, 
to make long, to lengthen, to stretch out, to produce, I have 
founded my explanation of to belong, " to reach, to attain, to per- 
tain, to appertain," an explanation which leads to and accounts 
for that consequential usage w^hich Johnson and Webster concur 
in giving as the primary meaning, " to be the property of," (rather 
to be or become). 



74 OF PREPOSITIONS. 

Save is tlie imperative of the verb. 

OuTCEPT is whimsically composed of out and 
capere, instead of ex and capere. Out-take and out- 
taken were formerly in very common use. 

Nigh, I^ear, is the Anglo-Saxon adjective nih, 
neh, neah, nealig, vicinus ; and Next, the Anglo- 
Saxon superlative neahgest, nehst. 

Instead, in Anglo-Saxon is on or in stede, that 
is, in place. Hence Step or sted-father , Anglo-Saxon 
steop-fseder ; in Latin vice or loco, Italian in luogo, 
in Spanish en lugar, French au lieu, in Dutch in 
stede or in plaats, German on statt, Danish istceden, 
in Swedish (as we use either \\oni^stead or home- 
stalT) it is istaellet. [Wachter had so far anticipated 
the etymology of 5^e^-father, &c. as to write, " Vide 
annon stief-vater, sit vice-pater ; stief -muter , vice- 
mater ; stief-son, vice-filius, sc. representatione aut 
substitutione." But he refers both the German 
stief 2ixA the Anglo-Saxon steop to the Anglo-Sax- 
on stow of the same meaning, namely, place. In 
Danish the compounds are all written stied-fader, 
moder, broder, &c. ; and "at vasre een ifader^s stied,^'' 
is " to be one in a father^ s stead.'''' And our OAvn 
Miles Coverdale thus feehngly writes: " Haue 
compassio, oh, christen woman, upon those yonge 
innocent Orphans, which know not, nor have any 
confort nor hel23e upon erthe, save only the. Con- 
sider that God the Lord hath ordeyned the (in steede 
of their own mother) to be to the a right true 
mother, and requireth the to lone the and to do 
the good. The Christen State of Matrimony, Ixx.] 

About is from the Anglo-Saxon hoda (whence 



OF PKEPOSITIOlSrS. 75 

our English word to bode ; See but, abut ;) which 
means \hQ Jirst outward extremity or boundary of 
any thing. 

Aftek is the comparative of the noun aft, still 
used by our sailors: Gothic aftaro, Anglo-Saxon 
cefter, Dutch agter, achter, Danish efter, Swedish 
efter, atra, achter ; After is used as a noun ad- 
jective in Anglo-Saxon, in English, and in most 
northern languages. Hind, aft, and back, have all 
originally the same meaning. In Danish jTor og 
bag is owe fore and aft, or before and behind. 

DowisT. Adoion, Anglo-Saxon dun, 75?dun, of 
dune, deorsum. 

Camden and Bishop Gibson consider the rivers 
Dan or Daven (whence Da7i^ori or Davenport) the 
Don or Doven, the Dun, Dune, or Duven, to be so 
called, because carried in a channel, low, sunk in the 
ground, and to be from Duffen, — Britannice, sunk 
or low (depressum). Tooke agrees that duffen is the 
origin not only of the names of the rivers, but also 
of our word down (as perhaps Camden), but he is 
of opinion that duf-en is the past participle of the 
Anglo-Saxon verb duf-ian, dof-ian, daf-ian ; and 
also dyfian, to dive, mergere, to sink, to plunge, to 
dive, to dip. 

[The Anglo-Saxon dun, dune, Somner explains 
to be mons, a hill or mountain, a doicn.* 

A Down is a place {dofferi) sunk or lov) (locus 

* Mr. Taylor (8vo. edition) suggests that down, adown, is a con- 
traction of of -dune, off or from hill, downhill, proclivis, and adds 
that the Latin pronus is rendered from Boethius, by Alfred of -dune, 
and by Chaucer adowne. 



76 OF PREPOSITIONS. 

tnersus, depressusy To be on the down or downs 
is to be on a place sunk or low. 

To go or come to the down or downs is to go or 
come to the place sunk or low. 

To go or come down is to go or come, place or 
to place, sunk or low, and, with relation to those 
on the top, to descend. 

The Downs are the hills dipping down to the sea 
along the coast of Kent, under which our ships ride 
in safety. Of the same description are the Dunes 
on the coast of Holland, whence £)zmkirk. 

Down is sometimes used as a verb, or with the 
sub-audition of a verb, as " down with him ! " 

Locke writes, " If he be hungry, more than wan- 
ton bread alone will down.''^ Again, " I know not 
how absurd this may seem to the masters of de- 
monstration, and probably it will hardly dow7i with 
any body at first hearing." 

Johnson supposes an ellipsis of go, to go down, 
and he explains Locke's usages thus : " to be re- 
ceived, to be digested :" he should have added, ^' to 
be swallowed." This, be it observed, is his first 
explanation ; his second is ^^ to descend." 

The first affords a remarkable illustration of his 
method of interpretation, namely, to transfer to the 
word he is explaining a signification implied from 
the context. Mr. Trench observes that the great 
fault in Johnson's Dictionary is the non-recognition 
that a word has originally but one meaning, and 
that all the applications may be deduced from it. 
It is indeed the great fault, inasmuch as it is the 
fruitful parent of nameless others. Dr. Webster, 



OF PREPOSITIONS. 77 

it IS to be regretted, treads in Johnson's footsteps, 
and follows his mode of interpretation, and goes so 
far as to say that eye means — direct opposition ; 
and that mouth means — desires, necessities, re- 
proaches, calumnies, &c. &c.] 

Upon, Up, Over, Boye, Above, have a com- 
mon origin and signification. It is not necessary 
to trace these particles farther than to some noun 
or verb of a determinate signification, and this noun 
is the Anglo-Saxon ufa^ ufera, ufamoest ; altus, 
altior, altissimus; up, upon; upper, over: up- 
most, uppermost ; upperest, over est. 

Bove is Beufan, bufan ; above is on-bufan, " but 
I believe that ufon, ufa, upon, up, means the same 
as top or head, and is originally derived from the 
same source." Head* is in Anglo-Saxon heafod, 
heafd, the past participle of the Anglo-Saxon heaf- 
an or heof-an, to heave or lift up, whence uf-on, 
with the same signification, may easily be derived. 
'^ And I believe the names of all abstract relation 
(as it is called) are taken either from the adjectived 
names of common objects, or from the participles of 
common verbs. The relations of place are more com- 
monly from the names of some parts of our body." 

Under this, or some such impression, Wilkins 
constructed his diagram, to explain the local pre- 
positions, by the help of a man's figure ; and from 
Wilkins the Abbe de I'Epee borrowed his method 
of teaching the prepositions to his deaf and dumb 
scholars. 

* See infra, Heave, head, &c. 



78 OF PEEPOSITIONS. 

Ix, Out, On, Off, At. Tooke cannot satisfy 
himself about these words. In the Gothic and An- 
glo-Saxon there is the substantive inna, meaning 
uterus, viscera, venter, interior pars corporis (and 
in a secondary sense the Anglo-Saxon, inn, inne, is 
used for cave, cell, cavern). Out, not improbably 
from a word originally meaning skin, and thus in 
and out would come from two nouns meaning those 
parts of the body. 



CHAP. X. 

OF ADVERBS. 

ALL the indeclinables, except the adverbs, are 
now considered, and they are no more a se- 
parate part of speech than conjimctions and prepo- 
sitions. They will give little trouble. 

All adverbs in ly (the most prolific branch of the 
family) receive their termination from the corrup- 
tion of like, which word " like''' is at this day in 
Scotland frequently used instead of the Enghsh ly; 
e. g. A goo^like figm-e. 

Adrift is the past participle of the Anglo-Saxon 
verb Drifan, TTdrifan, to drive. 

Aghast, Agast. Tooke is inclined to tliink 
that the Gothic Xgids, territus, the past participle 
Qiagjan,tivfiere, may have become agisd, agist, agast. 
But the constant application of the word to that, 
which is Gazed, agazed, agaz'd (agast) upon with 
terror or consternation, seems sufficient to account 



OF ADVERBS. 79 

for its restriction to denote those feelings. A^ue 
is from the Gothic apis, fear, trembling. 

Go, Ago, Ygo, Goj^, Agon, Gone, Agone, 
are used indiscriminately by our old English wri- 
ters, as the past participle of the verb to go. 

Asunder (originally from the Anglo-Saxon 
sond, that is, sand) is the past participle 'Ksundren, 
or X5M?2(frec?, separated (as the particles oi sand are), 
of the verb sondrian, &c. to separate. 

Astray is the past participle T^strceged, of the 
Anglo-Saxon verb strosgan, to stray, to scatter. 
Hence straw, strow, strew, straggle, stroll, and also 
the straw (that is, straw-d, stray)-berry. 

Atwist is the past participle Ge-twised, 'Xtivised, 
'Ktwisd, of the verb tivisan, &c. torquere ; twisan, 
from tiva, twee, twi, twy, tweo, two. 

Awry is the past participle T^wrythed, 'Kwrythd, 
of the verb lorythan, writhan, to writhe. 

AsKEWj in the Danish skicev, is wry, crooked, 
oblique. Skiever, to twist, to wrest. Skiajvt, twisted, 
wrested. 

Askant, Askance, probably are the participles 
aschuined, aschuins. In Dutch schuin, wry, oblique ; 
schuinen, to cut avjry ; schuins, sloping, wry, not 
straight. 

Asw^OON is the past participle asuond, of the An- 
glo-Saxon verb Suanian, 'Kswunan, dejicere animo. 

Astound is the past participle estonned, of the 
French verb estonner, etonner, to astonish. 

Enough, in Anglo-Saxon genoT^ or genoh, ap- 
pears to be the past participle genoged, multiplica- 
tum, manifold, of the Anglo-Saxon verb genogan, 



80 OF ADVERBS. 

multiplicare. In Dutch genoeg, from genoegen, to 
content, to satisfy. 

Fain is the past ipsirticyple fcegened^fcBgen, fcegn, 
IcBtits, of the Anglo-Saxon YerhfcBgemanyfcegnian, 
gaudere, Icetari (to be glad, to rejoice, to fain.) 

Somner, 

Lief, Lieyer, Lievest, leof, leofre, leofest. 
Leof (for leofed or lufad, or lufod or luf ) is the 
past participle of the Anglo-Saxon verb lufian, to 
love, and always means beloved. Tooke considers 
this word lief, &c. to be a vulgarity which no mo- 
dern author would use. Yet Junius (his victim as 
he imagined) had written, " Though I use terms 
of art, do not injure me so much as to suppose I 
am a lawyer : I had as lief he a Scotchman." Let- 
ters, Y. i. p. 312. WoodfaU's Edition. 

Adieu, Farewell. The former is from the 
French a dieu, from the Italian addio. The latter 
is the imperative of the Anglo-Saxon verb far an, 
to go or to fare. How goes it? hoy^ fares it? 

Halt is the imperative of the Anglo-Saxon verb 
healdan, to hold. Hence also to hold, formerly 
written to halt. In German still halten, Dutch still 
houden, to halt or stop, German halten^ Dutch hou- 
den, to hold. 

Lo is the imperative of Look. " Lo, you there." 

Needs. Need is, used parenthetically, and an- 
ciently written nedes and nede is. So certes for cer- 
tain is. 

Prithee, I pray thee. 

To wit is the infinitive of the Anglo-Saxon verb 
witaji, and means to be known, sciendum; — rather 



OF ADVERBS. 81 

from the second infinitive to-witanne (as Mr. E. 
Taylor suggests). 

Perchance. Par-escheant, par-escheance, the 
participle of escheoir, echeoir, echoir, to fall. 

Percase (anciently parcas, parcaas) is per ca- 
surrif participle of cadere. 

Perad venture, anciently ^gr«w72fer,joar«W7z^er. 

Maybe, Mayhap. In "Westmoreland and other 
parts they use mappen, that is, may happen. 

Perhaps, Uphap. By or through haps ; Upon 
a hap. 

Hab-NAB. Hap 7ie hap ; happen or not happen. 

Be-like, perpetually occurring in our best old 
writers, is in Danish lykke, in Swedish lycka, and 
means luck, that is, chance, hazard, 'RAP, fortune, 
adventure. 

A-FOOT, On foot. 1^ oot-h.ot m^Q2iiiB immediately, 
instantaneously, without giving time for the foot to 
cool. So our court of Pie poudre, pied poudre, in 
which matters are determined before one can wipe 
the dust from one's feet. So E vestigio. 

Aloft, on loft, on luffc, on lyffc ; that is, in the 
luft or lyft (or the article omitted as superfluous, 
as in Anglo-Saxon and old English), in lyft, &c. 
In Anglo-Saxon lyft is the air or clouds; in Danish 
and Swedish luft is air; in Dutch, de loefhehhen, 
to sail before the wind ; loeven, to ply to windward ; 
loef the weather-gage. And from the same root 
are loft, lofty, to luff, lee, leeward, to lift, &c. 

Awhile, Atime. Whilst is a . corruption of 
whiles — time, that or Avhich. 

Aught or Ought is the Anglo-Saxon Hwit, a 
whit, whit. O was formerly written for the ar- 
G 



82 OF ADVERBS. 

tide a and tlie numeral one. So naught or nought, 
na wliit, or no whit. 

Forth, from the Latin foris ; the French had 
fors (their modern hors), and hence/b/'fA, — whence 
the old adverbs outforth, inforth, &c. See ante 
For in composition. 
Much, More, Most. 

Mow or mowe, is the preterperfect, and mowen or 
meowen, the past participle of the Anglo-Saxon 
mawan, metere. Drop (as is customary) the ter- 
mination en, and there is left mowe or mow, mean- 
ing simply that which is mowed or mown ; and as 
this Avas put together in 2iheapf hence, figm-atively, 
mowe was used in the Anglo-Saxon to denote Awr 
heap,'\ though we now confine it to a heap of coun- 
try produce ; as a harley-mow, a hay-mow, &c. The 
past participle or substantive was variously written, 
ma, mcB, mo, mowe, mow, which when regularly 
compared, give ma, ma-er (that is, mare), ma-est, 
(that is, m^st). Mcb, m^e-er (that is, msere), maa-est 
(that is, mgest). Mowe, mow-er (that is, more), mow- 
est (that is, most). 3Io, mo-er (that is, more), 
mo-est (that is, most). 

Much has taken the place of mo, which was con- 
stantly used by our old writers, and is the diminu- 
tive of mo, passing through the gradual changes 
of moAel, my^el, moclil, mucheh, moche, MUCH. J 
The interchange of k and h is common. 

[It is objected to this etymology (first I think by 



* Cockeram explains the verb to mow to acervate. 
t Gr. Douglas uses it for a heap of wood, or a funeral pile. 
(Dido's) ^n. B. 4. p. 117. 
:j: See Stoddart, Philosophy of Language, p. 233. 



OF ADVERBS. 83 

the learned Dr. Jamleson, who always treats Tooke 
with the respect and courtesy so becoming from 
one scholar to another), that ma is as really a com- 
parative as mare, both being used adverbially in 
the sense oi plus, magis. But this is not the only 
instance in which words expressing a positive state, 
affording a standard of comparison, have been used 
to denote a comparative degree. This has been so 
with less and worse. To less is to loose or put away, 
and the remainder of that from which any part has 
been lest or lost is an object of comparison with the 
original whole. And thus less, sufficiently denoting 
comparison, the grammatical form of lesser, used by 
our old writers, has fallen into disuse as unneces- 
sary. The same has been the fate of worser. To 
worse is to wear or waste ; and worse, worsen (as the 
Latin deterior, from de-terere^ is worn, loasted, and 
admits of comparison with that which is not. 

With mo the process has been eventually differ- 
ent. Mo or mow, that is, a heap (acervus), is a po- 
sitive object, formed by accumulation of parts, and 
affording a standard of comparison in relation to 
those parts. Successive accumulations or coacer- 
vations of mow upon mow, afforded other standards 
of comparison, requiring successively the termina- 
tions of er and est to express their relative degrees 
of comparison in the progress of increase. And this 
increase, commencing with that of mo or mow into 
mo-er or more, and not of the constituent parts of 
mo, — mo or mowe has not maintained its groimd as 
a comparative, but is used simply to express the 
positive object.] 

Kathee. Rath, rather, rathest, are in most com- 



84 OF ADVERBS. 

mon use, both as adjectives and adverbs, in our older 
English writers, and are simply the Anglo-Saxon 
Rath, Rathor, Rathost, celer, velox. The Italians 
have received the word from our JSforthern ances- 
tors, and pronounce it ratio, 

Chaucer writes, " Why ryse ye so rathe .?" Mil- 
ton, " Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies." 
Chaucer, " Come the rather out." " Thou Ian- 
guy shest for desyre of thy rather fortune." *^ The 
werst speche is the rathest herde." 

Fie is the imperative of the Gothic and Anglo- 
Saxon verb flan, to hate. 

Quickly is Gwic,the past participle of gwiccian, 
vivificare, and like, and means life-like or lively. 

Scarce, in Dutch Skaears, is rare, unfrequent. 

Seldom. The Dutch have also the adjective 
zelden, selden ; the Germans selten, the Danes seld- 
som, the Swedes sellsynt, rare, unusual, uncommon. 

Stark in Anglo-Saxon is strong. German 
Starck, Dutch Sterk, Danish Staerk, Swiss Stark. 

Yery means true, and is from the French adjec- 
tive Vrai ; anciently written by them and us, veray. 
(^Chaucer, Gower, &c.) 

Once, At oxce, Twice, Thrice, are merely 
the genitives, anes, &c. of T^ne, Xn, twai, twa, twe3, 
twi3, tliri, thry, &c. (the substantive time, turn, &c. 
omitted). In a trice ; in the time in which we can 
count three ; one, two, three, and away. [Gower 
writes treis.'] 

Atwo, Athree, are on twa, on thry ; in two, 
in three. 

Alone, Only, are all-one (or one being alt), 
one-like. 



OF ADVERBS. 85 

Anon, in Anglo-Saxon On-an, is in one, instant, 
moment, &c. subaudition. 

Spick and Span new. Spyker in Dutch means 
a warehouse or magazine ; in German spange means 
any thing shirting. Spick and Span-new means 
shining new from the warehouse. 

In Anglo-Saxon an means one, and on means in, 
which word on we have in English corrupted to an 
before a vowel, and to a before a consonant, and in 
writing and speaking have connected it with the 
subsequent words ; and from this double corruption 
has sprung a numerous race of adverbs, which (only 
because there has not been a similar corruption) 
have no correspondent adverbs in other languages. 

Aside, on side; Ablaze, on Maze; Aboaed, 
on hoard; Alive, on live, in life: and numerous 
others needing no explanation. 

Aye or Yea is the imperative of a verb of north- 
ern extraction, and means, have it, possess it, enjoy 
it ; and yes is ay-es, have, possess, or enjoy that. 

No and Not have the same extraction. In the 
Da^nish nodig, in the Swedish nodig, and in the 
Dutch noode, node, and no, mean averse, unwilling. 

Thus is the reader put into possession of Mr. 
Tooke's Etymology of English conjunctions, pre- 
positions, and adverbs, which are traced (the reader 
will perceive) with the most scrupulous minuteness, 
and, in general, supported by a great variety of well- 
chosen authorities, from which I have made, I hope, 
selections to a sufficient extent. And thus termi- 
nates the first volume of the ETrca IlrfpcEvra. 



86 



VOL. II. 



THE second volume opens upon us with the 
announcement of topics of more attractive 
importance than the distribution of the parts of 
speech, and the etymologies of conjunctions and 
prepositions : for, though these in the hands of 
Home Tooke bear a very different character from 
that with which any other grammarian has con- 
trived to invest them, yet it must be allowed that 
chapters on the rights of man and on abstraction 
are far better calculated to arrest and engage the 
attention of the philosophical enquirer. 



CHAP. I. 

or THE EIGHTS OF MAN^. 

THE words to which we are first introduced 
are right, just, and law ; also wrong and left: 
and on these it is necessary that our Author 
should be heard somewhat at large : — 

Eight, etymologically, is " rect-um (regit-um), 
the past participle of the Latin verb reg-ere." 

Just, is (juss-voai), the past participle of. the 
verb jub-ere.* 



* Whence the Italian Eitto ; and from the past participle Di- 
rectum,^ of the compound Di-rigere, — Diritto, Dritto, the ancient 
French Droict, and modern Droit. 



OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 87 

Law (or as anciently written, lagK), " is the 
past participle of ~L^'^, or Lge3h, of the Gothic and 
Anglo-Saxon verb lag j -an, Lecg-an ; ponere," to 
lay down. 

Right, is that which is ruled or ordered. 

Just : that which is ordered or commanded. 

Law : that which is laid down, as a rule, order, 
or command. 

^^ When a man demands his right ; he asks only 
that which it is ordered he shall have : " (that 
which is just, which is laid down, as a rule, that he 
should have). 

A claim of Rights by the people, " is the 
strongest avowal of their subjection (to the law). 
Nothing can more evidently show the natural dis- 
position of mankind to obedience than their in- 
variable use of this word right, and their perpetual 
application of it to all which they desire, and to 
everything which they deem excellent. 

** A right conduct, a right reckoning, is that 
which is ordered. 

" A right line, is that which is ordered or directed 
to be pursued, not a random extension, but the 
shortest between two points. 

" A right road is, that ordered or directed to be 
pursued (for the object you have in view). 

" To do right is to do that which is ordered to 
be done. 

" To be in the right is to be in such situation or 
circumstances as are ordered. 

*^ To have right or law on one's side, is, to have 
in one's favour that which is ordered or laid down. 



88 OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 

" A rnght or just action is, such a one as is or- 
dered and commanded. 

" A JUST man is, such as he is commanded to 
be — qui leges juraque servat — who observes and 
obeys the things laid down and commanded. But 
that which is laid down, may be different by dif- 
ferent authorities ; and it is the authority that lays 
down, orders or commands, which must decide the 
question of obedience. 

" The right I revere is not the right adored by 
sycophants: the jus vagum, the capricious com- 
mand of princes or ministers. I follow the laio of 
God (what is laid down by him for the rule of my 
conduct) when I follow the laws of human nature;* 
which without any human testimony we know 
must proceed from God; and upon these are 
founded the rights of man, or what is ordered for 
man. I revere the constitution or constitutional 
laws of England ; because they are in conformity 
with the laws of God and nature, and on these are 
founded the rational rio-hts of Ens^lishmen." 

The other party to the dialogue commences the 
second chapter in the same strain: bringing us 
back to the etymology : — 



* Jus naturale est quod Natura omnia animalia docuit (he 
might have ssiid, jussit), H. T. Ulpian. Dig. book 1. tit. 1. law 1. 
parag. 3. 

" The general and perpetual voice of men is the sentence of 
God himself. For that which aU men have at all times learned, 
Nature herself must needs have taught ; and God being the Au- 
thor of Nature, her voice is but his instrument. By her from 
him, we receive whatsoever in such sort we learn." Hooker, Ecc. 
Pol. b. 1, § 8. 



OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 89 

" Before," he says, " there can be any thing 
recf-um., there must be reff-ens, Teg's, rex^ that is, 
qui or quod reg-\\j.\ And I admire (continues the 
speaker) more than ever the maxim of — rex, lex 
loquens ; lex, rex mutus. I acknowledge the senses 
he has given us, the experience of those senses, 
and reason (the effect and result of those senses 
and that experience), to be the assured testimony 
of God ; against which no human testimony ever 
can prevail. And I think I can discover, by the 
help of his etymology, a shorter method of deter- 
mining disputes between well-meaning men, con- 
cerning questions of right ; for if right and just 
mean ordered and commandQ^, we must at once 
refet" to the order and command; and to the autho- 
rity which ordered and commanded.^'' 

[And what that authority should be is (I may 
add) most emphatically, yet with admirable sim- 
plicity, declared by the Apostles Peter and John : — 
'^ And they called them, and commanded them not 
to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. 
But Peter and John answered and said unto 
them ; Whether it be right in the sight of God to 
hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye." 
And again, by Peter and the other Apostles, " Did 
not we straitly command you that you should not 
teach in his name? . . . Then Peter and the other 

* In the same way are formed judex, dux, vindex, index, sim- 
plex, from the present participle, judicans, ducens, &c. Some 
one judicating, leading, &c. 

\ " Effects are produced by power, not by laws. A law cannot 
execute itself, A law refers us to an agent." Paley, Nat. Theol. 
c. 24, 



90 OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 

Apostles answered and said; We ought to obey 
God rather than me?2."*] 

\Iliglit Sindjust, consistently with what has pre- 
ceded, I have thus explained, f 

" Bight implies a rector or ruler — over man as a 
created being ; God, or the laws of God, his Crea- 
tor : — over man, as a member of a particular state 
or society ; the laws of the land or of the society 
according or consistent with those of God. 

^^ Right also unplies a correlative Duty: if 
there be no such duty, the right or rule is a mere 
unauthorized order or command." 

Just. Commanded (sc.) by the laws of God ; 
by the laws of human authorities acting in con- 
formity to those of God, as manifested in the na- 
ture of man : and, consequently, our notions of jus- 
tice depending upon our interpretation of those laws. 

A just man is one who acts in a manner — and a 
just action, that which is — obedient and conformable 
(in the words of Hooker, b. 1, § 16) to the law, 
" which He (God) hath made for His creatures to 
keepe : The Law whereunto by the light of reason 
men finde themselves bound in that they are men : 
the law which they make by composition for mul- 
titudes and politique societies of men to be guided 
by ; the law, which belongeth to each nation ; the 
law that concerneth the fellowship of all; and 
lastly, the law which God himself hath superna- 
turaUy revealed." 

Law. Tooke's etymology is not original. The 

* Acts iv. 19j and v. 29. f ^ew English Dictionary, in w. 



OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 91 

very learned Wachter had adopted the opinion of a 
still older lexicographer,* who asks, " What is 
law, but that which is laid down, or imposed by 
God or nature, or by a people binding themselves, 
or by a prince governing a people ?"t Wachter 
goes farther, and observes, that if we were to de- 
rive the Latin lex from the same source, we 
should not wander far, — nee a sensu vocis nee a 
ratione temporis ; since Scythian words are far 
more ancient than the Latin, and increased the 
Latin with many additions.] 

Wro7ig (written Wrang, wrong, or wrung), like 
the Italian torto, and the French tort, is the past 
tense or past participle of the verb, to wring, wring- 
an, torquQVQ ; and means merely wrung or wrested, 
from the right or ordered line of conduct. 

Wiclif gives an amusing instance of this literal 
sense ; he renders the Yulgate Latin, tortus nasus, 
a wrong nose ; and Tooke produces the following 
remarkable example of the literal usage of the two 
opposite words. Bight and wrong (that is, straight 
and wrested). " The dome of God is lykened to a 
bowe, for the bowe is made of two thinges, of a 
wronge tree and ryghte strynge, &c. And as the 
archer in the stretynge taketh the loronge tree in 
hys lyfte honde, and the ryght strynge in his ryght 
lionde, and draweth them atwynne, &c." — Dives 
and Pauper, 8th Comm. cap. 15. 

* Stiernliielmius. 

t Servius on Virg. -^n. i. 507, Jura dabat legesque viris, 
makes this distinction in usage between jws and lex. Jus generale 
est ; sed lex est juris species. Jus ad non scripta etiam pertinet. 
Leges ad JUS scriptum. 



92 OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 

[ Wrong, used a substantive, in a figurative sense, 
I find as early as Robert of Gloucester, " Gret 
wrong, thou woldest don us." And of the verb, 
formed on the past participle of to loring, Gower 
has this striking instance : 

" For whan that H0I7 Churche wrongeth, 

I not (know not) what other thyng shall right."] 
And this brings me back to account for the op- 
position of 7'ight and left 

The right hand is that which custom and those 
who have brought us up have ordered or directed 
us to use in preference, when only one hand is em- 
ployed ; and the left hand is that which is leaved, 
leaved, left, or which we are taught to leave out of 
use on such occasion. 

Though the people of Melinda use as their right 
hand that which with us is the left, yet the people 
of Melinda are right handed, in as much as they 
obey the order established by the usages of their 
country. 

In the following quotation from Spenser, the 
left arm is that which we so call : — 

^* And whiles he (the Giant) strove his combred 
clubbe to quight 

Out of the earth, with blade all burning bright. 

He (Arthur) smott ofi'his left arme." 

Faerie Queene, c. 8, § 10. 

In the following, the left is the right, but the 
only one left, or the giant would be presmned to 
have had two left arms : 

" In force, which wont in two to be disperst. 

In one alone left hand, he now unites, 



OF THE EIGHTS OF MAN, 93 

Which is, through rage, more strong than both 
were erst." — Ibid. c. 8, § 18. 

[It would have been more agreeable to Tooke's 
principles and practice, and exemplified in the op- 
posite, Wrong, to have given his explanations of 
riffht line and ri^ht road the priority, since they 
include the literal meaning of the word, on which 
all the others depend. " The voice of a crier in 
desert. Make ^e redi the weie of the Lord, Make 
3e hise pathis 773^. (r^c^as facite semitas ejus)." — 
Wiclif, Luke iii. 4. 

The transference of this literal to the figurative 
meaning is thus happily illustrated by Hooker : — 

" As they, which travel from city to city, en- 
quire ever for the streightest way, because the 
streightest is that which soonest bringeth them to 
their journey's end; so we, having here, as the 
Apostle speaketh, no abiding city, but being always 
in travel towards that place of joy, immortality and 
rest, cannot but in every of our deeds, words, and 
thoughts, think that to be best, which with most 
expedition leadeth thereunto, and is for that very 
cause termed right. '^^ — Sermon on Pride. 

" Goodnesse in actions is like unto straightnesse : 
wherefore that which is done well we terme right : 
for as the strait way is most acceptable to him that 
trauaileth, because by it he commeth soonest to his 
journey es end: so in action, that which doth lye 
euenest between us and the end wee desu^e, must 
be the fittest for our use." — Secies. Pol. b. i. § 8. 

Having thus the true meanings of the words, 
right, just and wrong, traced to their source, and 



94 OF THE RIGHTS OP MAN. 

tlie foundation of their various applications laid 
before us, I shall proceed to present the reader 
with my own views, as to the meaning of two 
words of equal importance, due and ought, the 
correlatives or reciprocals of right, just and wrong. 
The latter of the two {oughi), the ro ^£ov, in the 
neoteric compound, deontology, has figured very 
conspicuously in some modern works on morals. 

Due, is from the French deu, past participle of 
the verb dehvoir, devoir ; the Latin deh-ere, that is, 
de-habere (which is to say, de alio habere), to have 
or hold of or from another : and thus a due or debt 
(debit-urn, debt) is " Any thing had or held of or 
from another : his right or property ; that which 
is owed to him." 

The identity of meaning conveyed by our own 
word ought is well worthy of consideration from 
the student in philology. 

Ought is the past tense of the verb, to owe, 
owed, ow'd, owt or ought; fr'om the Gothic and 
Anglo-Saxon verb aig-an, ag-an, to have or hold. 

Own is also the past participle owen, own, from 
the same verb. And both ought and own are used 
as verbs, formed on the respective past participles. 

To owe, in our older writers, is constantly em- 
ployed in its primitive meaning, to have, hold, or 
possess ; and is so explained by the commentators 
of our dramatic writers. 

Bishop Hall uses oicer and owner as equivalent : 
he speaks of God, in one place as Ower, and in 
another as Owner, of Heaven. " And Oon (debtor) 
ought 500 pens," is Wiclif 's rendering of — imus 
debehdii. And Tyndale employs the same word. 



OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 95 

" For neither sones owen : Nee enim filii de- 
hent:''^ "quantuni dehes domino, (that is, de-habes 
domino,) How much oivist thou my Lord?" is, 
" How much hast thou, holdest or retainest thou, 
that belongs to, which is the property of, is due 
{dehitnm) to my lord, which ought at some time to 
be delivered or paid to him." 

I am afraid I may have in some degree sub- 
jected myself to the charge of prolixity by writing 
so copiously on these few words ; but their mean- 
ing and usage are so essential in every question of 
morals and system of morality, that I cannot think 
any apology required. 

I have dedicated a long period of my life to the 
task of endeavouring " to draw out the stores of 
thought, which are latent in our native language, 
and to give distinctness and precision to whatever 
is confused or dimly seen." And it is a great re- 
tributory satisfaction to me to find that the value 
of such employment is rising in the estimation of 
some of the most distinguished of those who have 
felt " an inward call to teach and enlighten their 
countrymen." 

I do not hesitate to claim the thanks of my read- 
ers for the following quotations. 

" A language will often be wiser, not merely 
than the vulgar, but even than the wisest of those 
who speak it. Being lil^e amber in its efficacy to 
circulate the electric spirit of truth, it is also like 
amber in embalming and preserving the relics of 
ancient wisdom, although one is not seldom puzzled 
to decipher its contents. Sometimes it locks up 
truths which were once well known, but which in 



96 OF THE EIGHTS OF MAN. 

the course of ages have passed out of sight and been 
forgotten. In other cases it holds the germs of 
truth, of which, though they were never plainly 
discerned, the genius of its framers caught a glimpse 
in a happy moment of divination. A meditative 
man cannot refrain from wonder, when he digs 
down to the deep thought lying at the root of many 
a metaphorical term employed for the designation 
of spiritual things, even of those with regard to 
which professing philosophers have blundered gross- 
ly; and often it would seem as though rays of 
truths, which were still below the intellectual ho- 
rizon, had dawned upon the imagination as it was 
looking up to heaven. Hence they who feel an 
inward call to teach and enlighten their country- 
men, should deem it an important part of their 
duty to draw out the stores of thought which are 
already latent in their native language, to purify it 
from the corruptions which Time brings upon all 
things, and from which language has no exemption, 
and to endeavour to give distinctness and precision 
to whatever in it is confused, or obscure, or dimly 
seen." — Guesses at Truth. First Series, p. 295. 

" I would urge on you how well it will repay 
you to study the words which you are in the habit 
of using or of meeting, be they such as relate to 
the highest spiritual things, or our common words of 
the shop and the market and all the familiar inter- 
course of life. It will indeed repay you far better 
than you can easily believe. -I am sure, at least, 
that for many a young man his first discovery of 
the fact that words are living powers, has been like 



OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 97 

dropping scales from liis eyes, like the acquiring of 
another sense, or the introduction into a new world ; 
he is never able to cease wondering at the moral 
marvels that surround him on every side, and ever 
reveal themselves more and more to his gaze." — 
Trench. Study of Words, pp. 1, 2. 

" Language may be considered as the outward 
vesture of thought; thought as a body which is 
contained within this clothing ; and we may attend 
especially to the one or the other ; to the body or 
to the garment. But further, language includes 
within its folds, not merely thought, the result of 
the reason operating purely and simply, but thought 
excited, unfolded, and swayed by the various feel- 
ings which belong to man." 

" The body of which language is the clothing, 
is not the reason merely, but the whole nature of 
man.^'' — Wheioell. Liberal Education, Sec. 2, § 11, 

I repeat that I think myself entitled to the thanks 
of my readers for laying the above quotations be- 
fore them. They point out to them very precisely 
the great advantages that will result to them from 
the study of words ; from a diligent search for the 
rehcs of ancient wisdom, the germs of truth, some 
forgotten, some never plainly discerned, which they 
contain. They are promised that scenes scarcely 
short of exciting wonder will open upon them, when 
they dig down to the deep thought that lies con- 
cealed below. That they will be introduced to a 
new world with moral marvels surrounding them on 
every side, and ever revealing themselves more and 
more to their gaze. 

H 



98 or THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 

They are told in few but comprehensive words, 
that language includes within its folds thought, not 
merely mental or the result of reason, but thought 
however affected by our feelings. In short, that 
language being the vesture of the whole nature of 
man, must be unfolded to enable us to discover that 
nature. 

I close these quotations on the grand acquisitions 
that may be expected from the study of language, 
with repeating the plain and simple words of the 
author, whose principles I am endeavouring to un- 
fold and illustrate. 

" I very early found it, or thought I found it, 
impossible to make many steps after truth and the 
nature of human understanding, oi good and evil, of 
right and wrong, without well considering the na- 
ture of language, Avhich appeared to me to be inse- 
parably connected with them."] 

But I have yet a few words more to say, on 
Right and Just, as they mean ordered or com- 
manded. The expression of Locke, " God has a 
right,"* and the common one, " God is just," appear 
to be improper, as inapplicable to the Deity, con- 
cerning whom nothing is ordered or commanded. 
"They are applicable only to man, to whom alone 
language belongs, and of whose sensations only 
words are the representatives." 

[The expressions are certainly improper, but they 
are perhaps unavoidable in our well-meant attempts 
to bring the attributes of God more familiarly 

* Essay, b. 2, c. 28, § 8. 



OF THE EIGHTS OF MAN". 99 

within our apprehension by supposed analogies to 
ourselves, and our conformity to the rules or laws 
to which we acknowledge our subjection. The use 
of such expressions is of the nature of that anthro- 
pomorphism which was the consequence of a too 
literal interpretation of the text of Scripture, " So 
God created man in his own image, in the image 
of God created he him."* 

From this error of applying words so inapplicable 
to the Deity, our moralists and divines have found 
themselves plunged into difficulties without any 
means of escape. Among the most deservedly ce- 
lebrated of the latter is Dr. Samuel Clarke. If he, 
so famed among the famous for his reasoning pow- 
ers, both as divine and metaphysician, had been 
aware of the meaning of the words he was employ- 
ing and of the source of that meaning in the nature 
of man, he would not have involved himself and his 
readers in such verbal entanglements as unfortu- 
nately he has done. He is assuredly correct in as- 
serting " that whatever God does, we are sure it is 
right, because he does it;" for the proposition is 
purely identical. But he proceeds to say, in ex- 
planation, " yet the meaning of this is not that 
God's willing or doing a thing makes it right ^^ (that 
is, makes it the thing ruled or commanded), " but 
that his wisdom and goodness is such that we may 
depend upon it even without understanding it, that 
whatever he wills was in itself right, antecedent to 



* For Paley's solution, see Moral and Political Philosophy, B. 
1. c. 9. 



100 OF THE EIGHTS OF MAlf. 

his willing it, and that therefore he willed it because 
it was righty* 

We must undoubtedly rely on our own under- 
standings and the best exercise of the faculties wdth 
which our Creator has endowed us, to attain a 
knowledge of what is eight, that is, of what are 
the laws willed by him for securing our " being's 
end and aim," the happiness of our kind. And ac- 
cording to the conclusions at which we arrive, so 
should we order and direct our conduct. 

" What is written in the Law ? How readest 
thou?" " Understandest thou what thou readest." 
These are the solemn questions that we have all to 
answer, and well is it with those who enter on the 
enquiry with eyes not blinded and with hearts not 
hardened. 

" Kight," I may be allowed to continue in the 
words of one of our most sensible and sagacious 
moralists,! " Right is consistency with the will of 
God. And, as the will of God is oui' rule, to en- 
quire what is our duty or what we are obliged to 
do in any instance, is in effect to enquire what is 
the will of God in that instance, which consequently 
becomes the whole business of morality." And he 
further very justly observes, on ^'^ the absurdity of 
separating natural and revealed religion from each 
other. The object of both is the same, to discover 
the will of God, and provided we do but discover 
it, it matters nothing by what means." 



* Serm. 9, and to the same effect, Ser. 10. 

f Paley, Moral and Political Philosophy, B. 2. c. 9. and 4, 



OF THE EIGHTS OF MAN. 101 

It will now, I think, be a matter of little diffi- 
culty to dispose of the unjust remark of Professor 
Stewart* (bordering more closely on sarcasm than 
is usual with that agreeable writer), that Tooke at- 
tempts to found a theory of morals on a philological 
nostrum of past participles. The very reverse is 
the fact. The nostrum of past participles is the re- 
sort of language to express those principles of mo- 
rals (and these w^hen combined constitute a theory 
of morals) which are written in the heart and mind 
of man, "in the whole nature of man" by the hand 
of his Maker.] 



¥ 



CHAP. 11. 

OF ABSTRACTION. 



THE enquiry now proposed is. Will this man- 
ner of explaining right, just, law, droit and 
dritto, extended to other words of the same charac- 
ter, enable us to account for what is called abstrac- 
tion and abstract ideas. The answer is, " I think 
it will, and if it must have a name, it should rather 
be called subaudition than abstraction, thou2:h I 
mean not to quarrel about a title." 

[This then is the proper stage, before proceeding 
with the etymologies, to come to an understanding 
of the doctrine of abstraction and of abstract ideas, 

* The accomplished Professor is said by no unfriendly critic to 
have been " not a little susceptible of hasty but inveterate pre- 
judices." Hallam, Literature of Europe, Pt. 3, c. 4. 



102 or ABSTRACTION. 

as we find it taugtt by Locke and rejected by 
Berkeley^ as it is with this doctrine pecuHarly that 
onr author has to encounter ; and then it may be 
both expedient and appropriate to subjoin some 
changes that have been made in the usage of those 
terms by modern philosophers and logicians. 

" The use of words," says Locke, " being to 
stand as outward marks of our internal ideas, and 
those ideas being taken from particular things, if 
every particular idea that we take in should have 
a distinct name, names must be endless. To j^re- 
vent this, the mind makes the particular ideas re- 
ceived from particular objects to become general^ 
which is done by considering them as they are in 
the mind such appearances, separate from all other 
existences, and the circumstances of real existences, 
as time, place, or any other concomitant ideas. 
This is called Abstraction, whereby ideas taken 
from particular beings, become general representa- 
tives of all of the same kind, and their names gene- 
ral names, applicable to whatever exists conform- 
able to such abstract ideas. Such precise naked 
appearances in the mind, without considering how, 
whence, or with what others they come there, the 
understanding lays up, witli names commonly an- 
nexed to them, as the standards to rank real exis- 
tences into sorts, as they agree with these patterns, 
and to denominate them accordingly." B. 2. c. 11, 
§ 9. " General ideas," he afterwards writes, " are 
fictions and contrivances of the mind, that carry dif- 
ficulty with them, and do not so easily ofier them- 
selves as we are apt to imagine. For example, does 



OF ABSTKACTIOIT. 103 

it not require some pains and skill to form the idea 
of a triangle, which is yet none of the most abstract, 
comprehensive, and difficult, for it must be neither 
oblique nor rectangle, neither equilateral, equicru- 
ral nor scalenon, but all and none at the same time." 
B. 4. c. 7. § 9.* 

Had Locke been labouring to cast ridicule upon 
the doctrines of an antagonist, he could scarcely 
have fixed upon a more happy circumstance than 
this same triangle. It is barely exceeded by the 
universal Lord Mayor of Crambe, a Lord Mayor 
" not only without his horse, gown, and gold chain, 
but even without stature, feature, colour, hands, 
head, feet, or any body;"! and this Crambe sup- 
posed was the abstract of a Lord Mayor. 

In about five years after the death of Locke, his 
doctrine of abstraction and of abstract ideas met 
with an opponent in Bishop Berkeley, who ex- 
presses himself thus : " I own myself able to ab- 
stract in one sense, as when I consider some parti- 
cular part or parts separated from others, with 
which, though they are united in some object, yet 
it is possible they may really exist without them. J 

* Gassendi had the palm of priority, and he ought not to be 
deprived of it. " At difficile quidem est ne dicam impossibile ita 
pure hominem in commune imaginari ; ut neque magnus, neque 
parvus, neque mediocris staturse sit ; ut neque senex, neque in- 
fans, neque intermedise aetatis ; ut neque albus neque niger, neque 
alterius specialis coloris. At mente saltem tenere oportet, homi- 
nem, quern communiter consideratum volumus, debere esse his om- 
nibus discriminibus absolutum." Gassendi, Op. V. 1. p. 95. Lo- 
gica, P. 1. Can. 8. 

f Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus, eh. 7. 

X See the quotation from Stewart infra. 



104 OF ABSTRACTION. 

But I deny that I can abstract one from another, 
or conceive separately, those qualities which it is 
impossible should exist so separated, or that I can 
frame a general notion by abstracting from particu- 
lars in the manner aforesaid. Which two last are 
the proper acceptations of abstraction ?^^^ 

Locke advances it to be his opinion, that the fa- 
culties of brutes cannot attain to abstraction, and 
Berkeley agrees with him. But the reason given 
by Locke is, that they have no use of words or 
other general signs, on the " supposition," says 
Berkeley,! " that the making use of words impUes 
the having general ideas, from which it follows, 
that men who use language are able to abstract or 
generalise their ideas." For " since all things that 
exist are only particulars, how come we by general 
terms ? " Thus : " words become general by being 
made the signs oi general ideas. "^^X 

To which the Bishop answers : " But It seems 
that a word becomes general by being made the 
sign not of an abstract general idea, but of several 
particular ideas, any one of which it indifferently 
suggests to the mind." 

To the same effect, Hume : " All general ideas 
are in reality particular ones attached to a general 
term, which recalls upon occasion other particular 
ones that resemble in certain circumstances the 
idea present to the mind."§ 

And still further to the purpose the Bishop ob- 

* Principles of Knowledge, Introd. § 10. 

f Introd. § 11. + B. 3. c. 3. §6. 

§ Enquiry, Note P. And see Hobbes' Leviathan, P. 1, Ch. 1 . 



OF ABSTK ACTION. 105 

serves : " A little attention will discover that it is 
not necessary (even in the strictest reasonings) sig- 
nificant names which stand for ideas should, every 
time they are iised, excite in the understanding the 
ideas they are made to stand for: in reading and 
discoursing, names being for the most part used as 
letters are in Algebra, in which though a particular 
quantity be marked by each letter, yet to proceed 
right it is. not requisite that in every step each let- 
ter* suggest to your thoughts that particular quan- 
tity it was appointed to stand for." § xix. 

The complete solution of the difficulty awaited 
the aid of the philosophical grammarian ; for even 
the very acute Bishop, who clearly saw how much 
the nature and abuse of language were involved in 
the question, and that for the purpose of communi- 
cation the supposition of abstract ideas was unne- 
cessary, did not embrace the whole truth, and that 
merely because he mistook the general sign to be a 
general idea. He says, " I do not deny absolutely 
that there are general ideas, but only that there are 
any abstract general ideas ; we shall acknowledge 
that an idea, which considered in itself is particular, 
becomes general by being made to represent or 
stand for all other particular ideas of the same sort. 
To make this plain by an example, suppose a geo- 
metrician is demonstrating the method of cutting a 
line into two equal parts. He draws, for instance, 
a black line of an inch in length, — this, which in 

* This letter or sign is in the language of modern philosophers, 
" the idea objectified." Morell, Elements of Psychology, Ch. 5. 
§3. 



106 OF ABSTRACTION. 

itself is a particular line, is nevertheless with regard 
to its signification, general ; since, as it is there used, 
it represents aU particular lines whatsoever ; so that 
what is demonstrated of it is demonstrated of aU 
lines, or, in other words, of a line in general. And 
as that particular line becomes general by being 
made a sign, so the name line, which taken abso- 
lutely is particular, by being a sign, is made gene- 
rar"" 

Now this is the whole of the matter ; the sign is 
general, but that is all, and when Locke affirms that 
" general ideas are fictions and contrivances of the 
mind," and Dr. Whately, ^' that genus and species 
are creatures of the mind," the same sort of answer 
may be given,= — that the only fiction or contrivance 
or creature is the name, the sign. 

Professor Stewart's view of abstraction (" if it 
can be properly called abstraction")! is not far dif- 
ferent from Berkeley's. " The power of consider- 
ing certain qualities or attributes of an object apart 
from the rest ; or, as I would rather choose to de- 
fine it, the power which the understanding has of 
separating the combinations which are presented to 
it, is distinguished by logicians by the name of ah~ 
str action.'''' X 

" ^Yhen we draiu offP says Dr. Whately, " and 
contemplate separately, any part of an object pre- 
sented to the mind, disregarding the rest of it, we 
are said to abstract that part." " Thus a person 
might, when a rose was before his eyes or mind, 

* Principles of Knowledge, Introd. § 12. 
t Id. ib. P. 1. § 5. + On the Mind, C. 4. § 1. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 107 

make the scent a distinct object of attention, laying 
aside all thoughts of colour, form, &c. And thus, 
though it were the only rose he had ever met with, 
he would be employing the faculty of abstraction,^^* 
The Abstraction of Professor Stewart and Arch- 
bishop Whately is not the Abstraction of Locke. 
It simply represents, according to the illustration 
of the Archbishop, a matter of fact, that when va- 
rious qualities centered in one object are presented 
at the same time to our senses, we may indulge one 
sense in preference to another: and this explana- 
tion of the word conveys in itself a harmless truth, 
but metaphysicians and logicians contrive to invest 
it with great and perplexing importance ; thus Mr. 
Mansell tells us that " in the sense" (of withdraw- 
ing the attention from one portion of certain phas- 
nomena given in combination to fix it on the rest) 
*^ Geometrical magnitudes are called by Aristotle, 
ra 8^ a<^atpfcr£wc5 because the geometer considers 
only the properties of the figure" (that is, I presume, 
objectifies the figure, and that alone) " separate from 
those of the material in which it is found. On si- 
milar grounds, he continues, is formed the scholas- 
tic distinction of abstract and concrete terms, since 
in the former the attribute is considered apart from 
the subject in which it is perceived by the senses, 
e. g, sight presents us only «ZZ>«" (the attri- 
bute) ; " the mind forms the conception albedo^ 
(the subject or sub-stratum). And so universals 
are gained by abstraction, that is, by separating the 

♦ Logic, B. l.§ 9. 



108 OF ABSTRACTION. 

phaenomena in which a group of individuals* re- 
semble each other from those in which they differ." 
I cannot undertake, and it is not necessary, to 
enter further into the doctrines of abstraction and 
generalization as they are taught by contemporary 
writers on logic and metaphysics, f Some of these 
writers seem busily employed in disinterring Aris- 
totle and searching among his remains to discover 
doctrines that have not reached their understand- 
ings ; they have yet to satisfy themselves whether 
he was realist, nominalist, or conceptionalist. It is 
gratifying, however, to observe that they are pay- 
ing the same tribute of respect to the merits of our 
immortal countryman, Locke. Mr. Morell, who 
seems so thoroughly acquainted with all that has 
been written abroad and at home towards the ad- 
vancement of mental philosophy, has the great good 
sense to recommend that " the whole chapter on 
words and language in general, should be well 
studied by every student of mental science." He 
should not have omitted to recommend the " Diver- 
sions of Purley," and he should particularly have 
directed their attention to the positions laid down 
in the first chapter of the first volume of the work, 
that " the errors of grammarians have arisen from 
supposing all words to be immediately either the 



* Meaning " the individuals of a group." Artis Logicse Eudi- 
menta, p. 21, Note o. 

f I must refer them to the larger works of Sir William Hamil- 
ton and the smaller of Mr. Mansell, and of Mr. Morell (Laws of 
Thought), and the Chapter on Objects, &c. in Mr. De Morgan's 
Formal Logic. 



OF ABSTRACTION". 109 

signs of things or the signs of ideas,* whereas in 
fact many words are merely abbreviations employed 
for despatch, and are the signs of other words;" 
and that these are " the artificial wings of Mercury, 
by means of which the Argus eyes of Philosophy 
have been cheated." 

Such words, I may add, contribute to those 
"perfections of language, which, not being properly 
understood, have been one of the chief causes of 
the imperfections of our philosophy."! 

But not only the Latin past participle, but the 
Latin present, has supplied us with a stock of words 
of this description. The termination ence and ance, 
so rich in the names of qualities, being merely the 
neuters plural in entia from the present participle 
in ens.\ On this termination I will pause for a 
moment, as I am here again supplied with an oppor- 
tunity of presenting some views to my readers 
which I trust will have the effect of throwing a 
little light on the theory of language. 

" Every body will allow," say the sagacious au- 
thors of the Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus, " that 
if you debar a metaphysician from ens, essentia, and 
ejititas, &c. there is an end of him." 

There is one word of this class, of much use with 
metaphysicians and logicians, which to me appears 

* Other names are the names of names. Hobbes. Leviathan, 
p. 4. c. 46. 

f So also negative terms, from which arose the doctrine of no- 
gaiive ideas. 

+ Ence is in old v^riters not uncommonly written ent, ents, as 
consequent, consequents, by Frith, Hobbes, J. Taylor, and Stil- 
lingfleet. 



110 OF ABSTRACTION. 

peculiarly obnoxious to remark, and that is the 
word diiFerence. On difference and its opposite re- 
semblance all scientific classification depends. 

Let us consider whence the origin and common 
application of this word, and we shall at the same 
time learn the origin and application of aU words 
of the same description. 

The Latin differentia, the neuter plural of defer- 
ens, means (things) which are different, differing, 
or which differ: and when we say, for instance, 
that A and B are different, or A and B differ, we say- 
no more than that they cause different impressions 
or ideas. 

From this, the true meaning of the word differ- 
entia, it became applied specifically to that, by or in 
which A and B for instance, differ from each other. 

Thus then the word difference has acquired an 
established usage in the comparison of greater or 
less in number and quantity : a greater number 
being eleven and a less ten, we see and say they 
differ ; and we further see and say they differ by 
one, and we call one the difference. Hence the 
expressions that two numbers difier by one, and the 
difference between two numbers is one, are precisely 
equivalent. But it must be manifest that this equi- 
valence can only subsist in cases which contain 
within them a sj)ecific quantity or number in or by 
which A and b, for instance, differ, and to which 
the word difference may be applied. Let us call 
this difference c. Then the expressions — A and b 
differ or are different by c, and — there is a difference 
c, between A and B are completely equivalent. 



OF ABSTRACTION. Ill 

But there are cases of a very dissimilar nature. 
Let us take two colours or two shades of what we 
call the same colour ; a darker or greater blue, a, 
and a lighter or less blue, b. They differ or are 
different, and by common usage we are allowed to 
say we perceive the difference. Call this difference 
C, and a moment's consideration will convince us 
of our error. We receive two different impres- 
sions; one called a darker, A, and the other a 
lighter blue, B, but we have no third impression of 
difference, c, as we had in our first supposed case of 
number. We may say with entire truth, that the 
darker colour. A, and the lighter, b, differ, but we 
cannot add by c. And unless we can include this 
last term, by 0, in our proposition, we are curtailed 
of a portion necessary to constitute the equivalence 
of Avhich we have spoken. 

A second illustration may be borrowed from 
sound. We hear a higher A, and a lower key, B ; 
we feel that they differ ; we receive two different 
impressions, but we do not receive a third impres- 
sion, c, that is, we do not hear the difference. 

Custom, however, permits us to say — we perceive 
the difference between two colours or two sounds, 
when the fact is we receive impressions that dif- 
fer, and nothing more. 

Let us now subject to the same investigation a 
word opposed to that which has just been dismissed, 
and see to what conclusion it will lead us; that 
word is resemblance. Upon this word Dr. Brown 
rests a whole theory of generalization, the theory 
of a sect, to which he would give the name of 



112 or ABSTE ACTION". 

" notionist or relationist" in preference to tliat of 
" conceptionalist" bestowed upon Dr. Reid and his 
followers. 

Let the very elegant lecturer be allowed to speak 
in his own words : * " We perceive two or more 
objects ; this is one state of mind ; we are struck 
with the feeling of their resemblance in certain re- 
spects. This is a second state of the mind. We 
then in a third stage give a name to these circiun- 
stances of felt remembrance, a name which is of 
course applied afterwards only where this relation 
of similarity is felt. It is unquestionably not the 
name which produces the feeling of resemblance, 
but the feeling of resemblance which leads to the 
invention or application of the name."! In other 
places this feeling is called a general notion. 

Dr. Brown is equally anxious to disclaim Crambe's 
universal Lord Mayor and Locke's abstract idea of 
a triangle, but if the mind can form one single ge- 
neral or abstract idea or notion, it surely is not so 
limited in its faculty as to be unable to form more, 
and it would have tried the ingenuity of the Doctor 
to fix a boundary at which it must cease to act. 
Locke seemed to be quite aware of the extremes 
to which his doctrine must necessarily extend, and 
he had the candour to display them fully without 
the least attempt to evade or even to palliate. 



* Brown on the Philosophy of the Mind, Lee. 47. 

f So Locke ; " Words become general by being made the signs 
of general ideas.'' B. 3. C. 3, § 6. And does the negative idea 
give rise to the negative term? And see the quotation from 
Locke, supra, p. 54 n. 



OF ABSTK ACTION. 113 

And this unequivocating honesty is one of the great 
charms of the Essay of Human Understanding. 
Successive writers have endeavoured to refine upon 
the principles of Locke, but they are still the same, 
however varied may be their guise, nor can any 
subtle change of phraseology strip them of the ex- 
travagant consequences with which he himself has 
invested them. He triumphs, it is true, in the dis- 
covery that the " whole mystery of genera and 
species which make such a noise in the schools, and 
are with justice so little regarded out of them, is 
nothing else but abstract ideas." Yet, perplexing 
as this whole mystery undoubtedly was, the ab- 
stract idea of a triangle, as expounded in the Essay, 
is a very fair match to it. 

Without entering into any further account of the 
gradations by which this doctrine of abstraction has 
been step by step reduced into the form in which 
Dr. Brown endeavours to preserve it from that 
disregard into which the genera and species of the 
schools have so long fallen, let us proceed at once 
to his feeling or general notion of resemblance.* 

He says, " We are struck with the feeling of 
their resemblance. This is the second state of the 
mind." To perceive the objects themselves, the 
different objects, is the first. Is it possible to per- 
ceive different objects, and not perceive that they are 
different, not be conscious of different impressions. 

To resume the instances of colour and sound : — 

* Locke was quite sensible of the influence of resemblance and 
difference upon the construction of general terms. B. 3. c. 3, 
§ 7, 8. 

I 



114 OF ABSTRACTION. 

We perceive two objects ; we see two pictures ; 
we hear two voices: we say that the colours of 
the two pictures, the sounds of the two voices, are 
similar or alike ; that they resemble. In conformity 
with the usages of speech, we say that we perceive 
a similarity or likeness. Pursuing the former il- 
lustration (of the usage of the word. Difference), 
calling the colours of the first picture A, and of the 
second b, there is nothing to represent a resem- 
blance c. We received in the former case a number 
of different impressions, or of impressions which we 
were conscious differed. In the latter we receive 
a number of like, shnilar, resembling hnpressions, or 
impressions which we are conscious resemble ; and 
of these we employ the complex and general term 
resemblance as the sign or name. And thus, I 
think, I may conclude, that the Doctor's hypothe- 
sis of a second state of mind in the process of gene- 
ralization is a mere fiction or contrivance, creature 
or illusion, of his own imagination.] 

To return to the question from which this di- 
gression has been made : — Will this manner of ex- 
plaining right, &c. extended to other words, enable 
us to account for what is called Abstraction and ab- 
stract ideas ? 

These other -words (included in the question) 
are generally participles or adjectives, used with- 
out any substantive — any name of person or thing 
— expressed in the sentence, to which they can be 
joined; and are therefore, in construction, con- 
sidered as substantives. Such words form the 
bulk of every language. In English, those bor- 



OF ABSTRACTION. 115 

rowed from the Latin, FrencL and Italian, we easily 
recognise : those from the Greek are more striking. 
Those which are original in our own language have 
been almost wholly overlooked, and are quite unsus- 
pected. 

These words, participles and adjectives, have 
been coined into moral deities, moral causes and 
qualities ; and having been poetically embodied and 
substantiated, have caused a metaphysical jargon, 
and a false morality, which can only be dissipated 
by etymology. 

To this etymology, the second, and also the third, 
fourth and fifth chapters are devoted, for the pur- 
pose of accounting for this so-called Abstraction. 

The second contains a miscellaneous assortment, 
the greater portion from the Latin, with a few 
through the French and Italian, from which it will 
be sufficient to select only such as present anything 
worthy of the distinction ; and among these the 
substantive post, from its various applications, first 
presents itself. Post is aliquid posit-mn.* used in 
English as substantive, adjective or verb, as ; — 

A post in the ground. 

A military post. 

To take post. 

A post under government. 

The post for letters. 

P(95^-chaise. Po^^-horses. 

To travel post. 



* Observe that in Englisli we use our article precedent to the 
verb. In Latin it is sequent. 



116 OF ABSTEACTION. 

and is always merely the past participle of ponere. 
And tlins in our present situation, intelligence of 
" the horrors of war/' will be probably conveyed 
by post ; but whether by positis equis, or positis 
hominibus, or positis ignibus, or positis telegraphis, 
or beacons of any kind, all will be by posit or 

post:'"" 

Then follows a list of upwards of fifty Latin 
verbs, whose past participles, with those of their 
compounds, have enriched our language with an 
abundant stock of abstract terms. Some of these 
have come to us (together with an immediate Latin 
progeny) not immediately from the Latin, but the 
French. For instance : — 

Feat, defeat ; Jit, benefit, comfit, profit, coun- 
terfeit, forfeit, sm^feit ; from the French, faict, fait, 
f aire I Latin, factum, y^cer^. 

Teait, portrait (formerly traict and portraict), 
treat, treaty, retreat, entreat ; French, traict, trait, 
traire ; Latin, tract-um, trahere, 

Yenue, avenue, revenue ; French, mnir ; Latin, 
venire. 

Suit, suite, pursuit, lawsuit; French, suivre. 

View, review, interview, counterview, purview, 
purvey, survey ; French, voir. 

Prize, price, from the French prendocQ. Latin, 
pre-Aewc^-ere, prend-QXQ, prens-um. 

[The history of this word is remarkable. The 
Anglo-Saxon hent-sm, to hold or take (as the hand 
does), is the Latin hend-ere, used only in composi- 

* See Trench, Lecture YI. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 117 

tion. From the Latin past participle prensum, 
came the old French prins, modern pris, on which 
latter is formed the verb prizer, to take, with not 
a letter of its Anglo-Saxon root remaining. From 
this verb, and past participle, we have prize, and 
its compounds Apprize, comprize, em- and enter- 
prize, mainprize, misprize, reprize, sur-prize : pri- 
son, misprision, culprit, reprieve.] 

To these I wiU add a few scattered etymologies, 
not appearing so intimately connected with the rest. 

Alert, is the Italian all'erecta, all'ercta, all'erta, 
from the Italian verb ergere. Latin erigere, to erect. 

To cucol (not cucolf/), from the Italian cucolo, 
a cuckow, is to do as the cuckow does : and cwcoZ-ed, 
cucol'd, cucold, its past participle, means cuckow- 
ed : served as the cuckow serves other birds. 

Poltroon", is pollice truncus. Multi prae ig- 
navia jooZlices ^rw^zcabant, ne militarent. And such 
by Yalentinian and Valens were condemned to be 
burnt. Hence Suho pal fr 7/. 

" Those sham deities. Fate and Destiny, 
sliquid fat-UTUf quelque chose destinee, are merely 
the past participles oifari and destiner.''^ 

Chance (high arbiter). Accident, and Es- 
cheat are from escheoir, cheoir, and cadere, to fall. 



118 

CHAP. TIL 

ON ABSTRACTION (^continued), 

ABSTRACT terms formed from past parti- 
ciples of verbs ; terminations ed, en, 

Braxd, brened, bren'd, brend, from tbe verb to 
hren, now written bum (by a common transposition 
of R ; see infra. Brawn). Hence a fire-brand, a 
brand of infamy; (that is, stigma;) itself a parti- 
ciple of SriJ uvi to prick, to burn, a mark (on run- 
away slaves). Brand-JiQ^ , newly burned. 

Blind, blin-ed, blin'd. Old English to hlin, An- 
glo-Saxon blinn-an, to stop; blind of one eye, of 
both eyes, stopped of one or both eyes, the sight 
totally stopped. The French have borgne for the 
first, and aveugle for the second. 

Braid, Bread. Brayed, bray'd, bread. To bray, 
(formerly a very common word,) French broyer, to 
pound, to beat to pieces. The subauditum (in our 
present use of the word bread) is com or grain, &c. 
Pounding or beating to pieces (now grinding) was 
the first step in the process of making bread. [He 
to braide his clothes {Gower). To beat his clothes. 
The devel to brayde hym. JViclif. MS. Tare him.] 
See infra. Dough, Loai\ 

Coward, that is, cowred, cowered, cowQr^ ; one 
who has coicer'^d before an enemy. To cowre or 
coicer is still in common use. Supplex, suppHcant, 
is of the same import. So suppHant and supple. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 119 

Cud. To chew the cud is to chew the chewed 
{ch to k, or k to ch, common changes). Anglo- 
Saxon ceow-ed, from ceow-an. [Hence perhaps 
cow, the animal which ceoweth, or chews, sc. the 
cudr\ 

Dastard^ dastriged, dastriyed, dastried, dastred, 
dastr^d, territus. Anglo-Saxon dastri^-siia., terrere. 
[On this past participle Dryden formed the verb, 
"And dastards manly souls." — Conquest of Mexico.'] 

Field, anciently written/eZcf, felled, fel'd, to fell; 
Anglo-Saxon fcell-an, be-faell-an, to cause to fall. 
Field land is constantly opposed to wood-lajid, and 
means land where the wood has been felled. In 
the collateral languages the same correspondence 
subsists between the equivalent verb and the sup- 
posed substantive. [Chaucer writes, " The felde 
hath eyen, and the wood hath eares ; " a very intel- 
ligible contrast. Gower also, " In woodde, m. felde, 
or in citee."] 

Flood, Loud; merely flowed, flow'd, and 
lowed, low'd. 

Head, heaved, heav'd, ^e«c?. Anglo-Saxon heaf- 
od, from heaf-Mv, to heave. Head, anciently writ- 
ten heved, is that part (of the body or anything else) 
which is heav'd, raised, or lifted up, above the rest.* 

Odd, owed, ow'd. When we are counting by 
couples or pairs we say one pair, two pairs, &c. and 
one owed or ow'd to make up another pair. It has 
the same meaning when we say, an odd man, an 
odd action ; it still relates to pairing (or matching), 

♦ See infra, p. 125. 



120 OF ABSTRACTION. 

and we mean without a fellow, unmatched, not such 
another, one owed to make up a couple. Sir Tho- 
mas More writes, " God in soveraine dignity is 
odde,^'' that is, unmatch'd. 

Shred, Sherd. Shered, sh'red, or shered, 
sher'd. Anglo-Saxon 5c?/r-an, to sheer. See infra, 
to sheer, &c. 

Whinid, Vinew'd, Fenowed, vinny or finie, 
past participle of Anglo- Saxon^wz^-ean, to corrupt, 
to decay, to wither, to fade, to pass away, to spoil in 
any manner. Finie hlaf is, in Anglo-Saxon, a cor- 
rupted or spoiled loaf, whether by mould or any 
other means. Hence the Latin van-u^ and van- 
esco, and a numerous issue in Italian and French, 
And see mhsi, faint, fen. [Grose says vinied, fenny, 
mouldy. Exm.'] 

Wild is Avilled, will'd (or self-willed), in opposi- 
tion to animals, &c. tamed or subdued to the will 
of others or of Societies. 

Fiend and Friend are not past participles, but 
from the so-called present participle. 

Fiend, (joihicflands, Anglo- Saxon ^«7?^, from 
fi-an, to hate (subaud. some one, any one) ; hating. 

Friend, Anglo-Saxon friand, freond; from 
frian, freon, to love (subaud. some one, any one); 
loving. 

Bent. A person's hent or inclination. Bended, 
bend'd, hent. 

Draught, Anglo-Saxon drag-^co., to draugh, 
(now draw) ; draugh-ed, draugh'd, draught. 

Gaunt. Ge-wan-ed, gewan'd, gewant, g'want, 
gaunt ; past participle of ge-wan-iaji, to wane, to 



OF ABSTRACTION. 121 

decrease, fall away. Ge is a very common prefix 
to Anglo-Saxon verbs. See infra. Want. 

Haft, haved, hav'd, haft, by which the knife, 
&c. is haved or held. 

Heft, heved, hev'd, heft " He cracks his sides 
with violent hefts.'''' — The Wiytters Tale. 

Hilt, held, helt, hilt, by which the sword is held. 

Malt, Mould ; French mouilU, past participle 
of mouiller, to wet, to moisten, becomes in English 
mouilled, mouill'd, mould; then moult, mault, malt. 
The wetting or moistening of the grain is the first 
and necessary part of the process in making malt. 

Tight, tied, ti'd, tight. " He halt him taied,^^ 
that is, he held him tight. — Gower. " A great 
long chaine he tight.''"' — Spenser. 

Tilt, to till ; Anglo-Saxon ifz'Z-ian, to raise, to 
lift up, to turn up (the ground). Tilt of a boat or 
waggon, the cover raised over it. To tilt (more 
properly to till) a vessel. See Tall, &c. infra. 

Twist, twiced, twic'd, ticist ; Anglo-Saxon ge- 
twgs-'dR, torquere. 

Want, waned, wan'd, tvant ; Anglo-Saxon wart" 
ian, decrescere, to wane, to fall away (sc. as the 
moon). See infra, wane, wan. 

Such words as cleft, clift, or cliif, drift, desert, 
feint, gift, joint, quilt, rent, rift, theft, thrift ; from 
the respective verbs cleave, drive, deserve, feign, 
give, join, quiU, rend (to tear), rive, rift, theft, 
thrift ; speak for themselves. 

Bacon, swine's flesh haken or dried by heat, 
Anglo-Saxon Z>«c-an. 

Barr-en, that is, barred^, stopped, strongly closed 



122 OF ABSTEACTIOK. 

up; wMcli cannot be opened^ from whicli can be 
no fruit or issue. See Bae, infra. 

Bearn or Beaexe, boren^ borne, born. A hearn 
or hariie (still common in northern counties) is a 
child bear-eTi or bar-ew. Born is, borne into life. 

ChueJs^, chyr-en, chjr'n, chyrn or churn; An- 
glo-Saxon cyr-an, to move backwards and forwards. 
See infra, Chae, Chaie, &c. 

Ceaven; one who has crav-ec? or crav-ew his 
life from his antagonist; dextramque precantem 
protendens. [On this word Shakespeare has formed 
the verb, to craven. " A prohibition so divine 
cravens my weak hand." — Cymbeline.'] 

Dawn", daw-en, daw'n, dawn; Anglo-Saxon, 
dag-\2iTi, to daiD ; lucescere, to grow light. [There 
daweth me no daie. — Chaucer.'] See infra. Day. 

Heaven (some place, any place). Heav-ew or 
heav-e^. See infra, to heave. 

Leave2^; that by which the dough is raised, 
French lever. The Anglo-Saxons called it haf-en, 
from heaf-an, to raise. 

SteeIs^, ster-en, ster^Ji, that is, stirred. A stern 
countenance is a moved countenance, moved by 
some passion. The stern of a ship is the moved part 
of a ship, or that part of a ship by which the ship 
is moved. Anglo-Saxon styr-sai, stu'-an, movere 
(to stir or steer). 

[The early version of the Bible by Wiclif and 
his followers, renders the Yulgate Latin austerus, 
austerne, or hausterne; the later version, sterne. 
And the Glossarist to G. Douglas says asterne, 
austere, fierce ; Latin austerus. The Anglo-Saxon 



OF ABSTRACTION. 123 

stir-BJi, a-stir-mn, will give an intelligible origin to 
both the Latin austerus and Greek Avtrrrjpoc.] 

Yaen, yare, yaren, yarn; prepared (subaud. 
cotton^ silk, or wool) by spinning. See infra^ 
Yare. 

Ed and en are qualified by their meaning, for 
adjective as well as participial terminations; as 
gold-en, brazen, wooden, &c., and formerly silver- 
en, ston-en, treen-en, &c. 

Br A WIST is an adjective, and means hoar-en, or 
hoards (subaudition) flesh. Our English word hoar 
is the Anglo-Saxon har, pronounced bawr, of which 
bar-en or bawr-en, bawrn, was the adjective ; and 
by the common transposition of r, hawrn has be- 
come hrawn. 

By the same transposition the Anglo-Saxon ggers 
has become grass ; byrht, bright ; wyrht, wright ; 
thersc-ian, thresh. Nostril (Avritten by Wiclif and 
Chaucer, nose-thirles ; by Sir Thomas Elyot, nos- 
thrilles) is in Anglo-Saxon neis-thyrl. [Anglo- 
Saxon ^AzVZ-ian, to drill, to bore.] And see ante, 
hrand. 

The broad pronunciation of a, as in hawr, is still 
common in northern counties. Thus Anglo-Saxon 
hat, a boat, is pronounced bawt; han^ a bone, 
bawn ; ham, home, hawm, &c. &g. 



124 



CHANGE OF CHARACTERISTIC. 

CHAP. ly. 

or ABSTRACTION (continued), 

THIS chapter is devoted to sucli substantives 
as are received from the past tense of verbs, 
formed by the various changes of the characteristic 
vowel, or vowel or diphthong, which in Anglo-Sax- 
on immediately precedes the infinitive terminations 
an, gan, &c. Those from i or y are most numerous, 
but some from a, e, &c. will be found intermixed 
in the following alphabetical arrangement. And 
these will be interesting not only as curious speci- 
mens of etymological sagacity, but as furnishing 
further and less familiar instances in illustration 
of our Author's doctrine, that a great multitude of 
abstract terms existing in our language have been 
supplied by past participles used substantively, that 
is, with a substantive (an aliquid) always under- 
stood. In selecting from the great number pro- 
duced, I shall prefer first those which assign a com- 
mon origin to a large family of words, most remote 
in their customary applications, and whose rela- 
tionship was before undetermined, and then a few 
less extensively related, but entitled to regard from 
the novelty they claim. 

Though much that is here presented has been 



I 



OF ABSTEACTIOK, 125 

transferred to our grammars of the better class, it 
will be necessary to lay before the reader sufficient 
to facilitate his apprehension of the apparently 
strange changes that have taken place in the mode 
of writing and speaking the same word, when taking 
a different direction in its usage; preserving to 
each mode its different usage, without losing sight 
of its one original meaning. 

It will also be necessary to premise a brief state- 
ment of the mode pursued or rules adopted by our 
ancestors in forming the past participle. The only 
mode they had was to add ed or en, either to the 
indicative mood of the verb or to the past tense. 
But the most usual method of speech was to em- 
ploy the past tense itself, without participializing it 
by the addition of ed or en. And so they commonly 
used their substantives without adjectiving them, in 
imitation of some other languages, and by adoption 
from them. 

As an instance, take the verb to heave, Anglo- 
Saxon heaf-an. 

By adding ed to the indicative they had 

the participle heaved. 

By changing d to t, and v to/, heaft 

By adding en they had the participle heaven. 

Their regular past tense was (Anglo- 
Saxon haf, hof ) hove. 

By adding ed to it, they had the parti- 
ciple hoved. 

By adding en, they had the participle hoven. 

And aU these they used indifferently. The ship 
or any thing else was 



126 



OF ABSTRACTION. 



Heaved 
Heaft 
Heaven 
Hove 



Hoved 



Hoven 



And these have 
left behind them in 
our modern lan- 
i> guage the supposed 
substantives, but 
reaUy unsuspected 
participles. 



r Head (1) 
Heft (2) 
Heaven 

Hoof, Huff, and 
the diminutive 
Hovel 
Howve or hood 
Hat, Hut 
Haven, Oven 



The past tense, Anglo-Saxon haf, hof, English 
hove, was variously written heff, hafe, howve. 

The hoof of an animal was written hove or howve. 
And so was a hood for woman's or monk^s-head. 

Huff, now applied to raised displeasure. 

Hovel and also hict, a small raised building. 

Haven, a place raised for security (embanked at 
a river's mouth). 

Oven, a place — for fire or furnace — raised. 

To huff, to raise, is used by our old writers. 

To hove or hoove, is used by Chaucer, Gower, 
and others, as we now use to hover. 

Returning to the word lorong, which has been 
called a past participle. It is not a past participle, 
but the regular past tense of the verb to wring. 
Our ancestors used a past tense where the lan- 
guages we are most acquainted with used a past 
participle ; and as from the grammars of the latter 
(or distribution of their languages) our present 
grammatical notions are taken, this word and others 
are considered and called past participles. 

In English or Anglo-Saxon (being the same 
language) the past tense is formed by change of 



OF ABSTKACTION. 127 

the characteristic letter, that is, of the vowel or 
diphthong immediately preceding the infinitive ter- 
mination an, gan, &c. To form the past tense of 
wrhig-an, to wring (as of other words), the charac- 
teristic vowel i or y was changed first into a broad, 
and this, from difference of pronunciation, was writ- 
ten either a broad or o or m ; as from wrmg, wrang, 
wrong, wrung. O from Alfred to Shakespeare 
prevailed in the South ; a in the North. During 
the former part of that period " so greate diuersite" 
was in use, that Chaucer complains of it. Since 
that time the fashion has changed to ou and u, and 
in some instances to oa, oo, and ai. 

Many, as the common grammars teach whose 
characteristic is i, continue to give the past tense 
in 0, from some of which we have substantives, as 
abode, drove, Shrove-tide, road (formerly rode), 
from the verbs abide, drive, shrive, ride. 

Many now written with a, u, ou, i, formerly were 
written with o : as gove, gave ; dronk, drunk ; fond, 
found ; slode, slid. These specimens must suffice 
and be borne in mind in reading the following 
pages.* 

Addle becomes ail, and idle becomes ill, by 
sliding over the d in pronunciation. Idle and ill 
are both applied to weeds. An addle egg, an ad- 
dle pate or brains, an idle head, are common ex- 
pressions. Wiclif ; the erthe was idel and voide. 



* Dr. Latham says, " Verbs may be said to fall into two con- 
jugations. Words like sang are called strong, because they are 
formed independently of any addition. Words like Jitl-ed are 
called weak, because they require the addition of the sound d." 



128 OF ABSTKACTION". 

Inanis et vacua. Feitli withouten workis is ideh 
Mortua. Anglo-Saxon aidlian ; to be weak or sick 
inert, useless, or fruitless ; to spoil or corrupt. 

Bar ; Gothic baijy-Sin, Anglo-Saxon Z>yr^-an. 
A Bar, in all its uses, is a defence ; that by which 
any thing is fortified, strengthened, or defended. 
[A bar to secure a door, &c. ; bar of an inn ; bar 
of a court of justice.] 

A Barn (bar-en, bar'n) is a covered enclosure 
in which grain, &c. is protected from weather, &c. 

A Baroi^, an armed, defenceful, or powerful 
man. 

A Barge, a Bark, a strong boat, a stout vessel. 

A Bargaiist ; a confirmed, strengthened agree- 
ment. 

The Bark of a tree is its defence from weather, 
&c. ; of a dog, defends us from harm. 

A Barken ; an enclosure (near the house from 
the open fields). 

[A Barton. A strong, secure enclosure.] 

A Barrack. A strong, defended building (com- 
pared with tents). 

A Barrier ; to keep off a mob ; to secure 
against inroad or invasion. 

A Burgh or Borough; formerly a fortified 
toivn. See Town. 

A Burrow for rabbits; to defend or protect 
them. 

A BoROWE ; a security ; any person or thing by 
which repayment is secured. [To borrow ; to take 
or receive, on pledge or security to repay or re- 
turn]. 

Burt ; to deposit in a secure, protected place. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 129 

So the Latin sepelire ; from seps^ a hedge, a fence. 

Haubeek or habergeon ; armour to protect the 
neck and breast ; from hals, the halse or neck, and 
berg-en, to protect, to defend. 

The French changed hals into hau, and made the 
word hpuberg, and the Italian made it usher go. 

Bough, Bow, Bay ; in Anglo-Saxon written 
hogh, hug, heah; past tense of byg-an, to bend or 
curve. 

Buxom. Anglo-Saxon bog-sum, boc-sum, buh- 
some ; Old English bough-some, easily bended or 
bowed to one's will; obedient (easily moved to 
good fellowship). 

BoTV, an inclination of the body, an instrument 
of war, of music ; a kind of knot ; the curved part 
of a saddle; the arc-en-ciel; curved or bended 
legs ; branches of trees, now written boughs ; a re- 
cess of the sea-shore (a ba}^, Latin sinus) ; also in 
buildings, barns, or windows (now a bow w^indow). 
In all these applications the word means bended or 
curved. [From the same source we have the hosom. 
So the Latin sinus and Greek Kokiroq, a bay, a 
bosom.*] 

Brook or Broke. " The struggling water 
breaks out in a Brook.'^ — Faithful Shepherdess. 

[A Broach ; any thing hroken or split off, so as 
to pierce. A broach of eels is a stick of eels ; so 
many eels hroched or stuck through a spit, a pin, 
are also so called; by which meat is stuck or pierced 

* And I may refer to the word hug in the additions to my 8vo. 
Edition, where I have enumerated many words not noticed by 
Tooke. 

K 



130 OF ABSTK ACTION. 

through ; by which ornaments of dress are stuck 
on. To hroach a vessel ; to break into it, by boring 
or piercing through. 

To broach a doctrine ; to break it open ; to dis- 
close it. 

A Beak or Break ; for a horse ; that by which 
his unruliness is broken : by which he is tamed or 
subjected to use.] 

A Breach or Break. "Is it no breahe of 
duetie to withstande your kinge ?" — Cheke. 

Breeches : to cover those parts where there is 
a breach in the body, or where the body is broken 
into two parts. 

Hence also the Lat. bracca : and, as TVachter, 
with Tooke, believes, (Bpa-^iujv, brachium. All 
from the Gothic Brikan: Anglo-Saxon Brecan, 
brascan, to break. 

Brown. All colours in all languages must have 
their denominations from some common object, or 
from some circumstances that produce those colours. 

Brown is the past participle of the verb to Bren, 
or to brin, now to burn (Fr. brun, Italian bruno, 
and also bronze, bronzo). Brown is merely burned 
(subaudition, colour). It has the colour of things 
burned. The brunt (bront, brount) of the battle is 
the heat of it. 

Green : gren-ian, virescere, viridis, verdant, from 
virere (and so Wachter). 

Grey : geregn-an, inficere, to stain. 

Yellow : Italian Giallo, French gialne, jaune, 
Anglo-Saxon ge-selged, ge-selg, ge-9elgen: past 
participle of ge-?elan, accendere, to kindle. As Latin 
flammeus, flavus, from ^Xe-yw, (fKzyiia, flanmia, 



OF ABSTRACTION. 131 

flame. See infra, ch. v. Ale. Hence also Yolk, 
Gold. 

White : Gothic Hwath-an, spumare, to foam. 

Cage ; a place shut in and fastened, in which 
birds are confined. Also a place in which male- 
factors are confined. 

Gage ; that by which a man is bound to certain 
fulfilments. 

Wages ; by which servants are bound to per- 
form certain duties. 

Gag; by which the mouth is confined from 
speaking. 

Keg ; in which fish or liquors are shut in and 
confined. 

Key; by which doors, &c. are confined and 
fastened. 

Quay ; by which water is confined and shut out. 
All from the Anglo- Saxon verb Caegg-ian, obserare; 
and hence also the French cage, gage, &c. the 
Italian gaggia, &c. and ancient Latin caiare. 

Char. A char or chare is a turn: a chare- 
woman, a woman who does not abide in the house 
where she works, as a constant servant, but returns 
home to her own place of abode, and returns again 
to her work when required. [(Qy ?) One who has 
a turn at work. It is my turn now; that is, it 
comes to me by rotation among others. When the 
post-chaise was in fashion, the drivers were called 
first or second turn boys. And this agrees with 
Tooke's explanation of char, a turn or bout ; that 
char is char'd ; that turn is turned : one good turn 
deserves another.] 



132 OF ABSTRACTION^. 

Chaie, is a species of seat, not fixed, but move- 
able — turnedi about, and returned at pleasure; a 
turn-seat. 

Car, Cart, Chariot, and the Latin Carrus 
[a \yord wbich Ihre and Wacbter bad previously- 
agreed was introduced into tbe Roman language 
by Julius Cassar, and wbieb is never used eitber 
by bim or Livy except wben speaking of tbe mi- 
litary vebicles of tbe Gauls]. Such vebieles were 
so called, in contradistinction to tbe sledge [tbe 
traba or trabea of Virgil]. 

AcHAR or Ajar : a door on tbe turn or return 
to sbut or open furtber on tbe binge, or car-do, 
on wbicb tbe door is turned and returned. 

Char, tbe fisb ; because (as Skinner) it so ra- 
pidly turns itself in tbe water. 

A c^wr-worm ; so called, for tbe same reason. 

A Chur'x. [A vessel, in wbicb, by constant 
turning of milk, butter is made.] 

Charcoal [called by Cbapman, tbe cole-turned 
wood. HoM. Od. b. 3]. 

All from tbe same verb, Cyran, acyran; and 
meaning something turned, turned about, back- 
wards and forwards. 

Deal, or as anciently, dell, or dole, is a part, 
piece or portion of any tbing : to deal tbe cards ; 
to give eacb bis part or portion : bis dole or dowle 
(bis part distributed), as tbe attendant beggars at 
tbe gate. [Tbe stones also wbicb are used in 
boundaries to divide land from land are bence also 
called dowle-stones — Somner. in v. Dtelan.] 

" He wolde bun tere every doule " ( Chaucer), 
every piece of bim, aU to pieces : piecemeaL Skin- 



OF ABSTRACTION. 133 

ner reasonably thinks that dollar also belongs to 
dal, a part or portion, because it is the half part of 
the golden ducat. 

All from the Gothic Dailjan, Anglo-Saxon 
deelan, to deal, to divide, to distribute. 

Dam ; from the Anglo-Saxon Dsem-an, demman, 
obturare, obstruere. That by which any thing, for 
example, a current, is stopped. 

A Dumb (formerly also written dum, or dome) 
person; one whose hearing is stopped. Three 
words, barren, bhnd, and dumb, are now applied 
respectively to the womb, the eyes, and mouth: 
but they were as the verbs, to bar, to blen, to 
dam, now are generally applicable : having one 
common meanino^ — obstruction^ and might have 
changed places. 

When Ben Jonson says, " This 'tis to have 
your ears dammed up to good counsell ;" he might 
have said, *^ This 'tis to have dumb ears, or ears 
dumb to good counsell." 

[In Dutch, dom is surdus, that is, deaf: the 
Greek tv^Xoq, is applied not only to eyes, but to 
ears and soul. Surdus is applied to scent by Per- 
sius, and to colour by Pliny. Deaf corn, is barren 
corn. A deaf nut ; the kernel of which has been 
stopped in its growth.] 

Our Winds are named by their distinguishing 
qualities. Our ancestors knowing the meaning of 
the words they employed, applied to the four winds 
the past participles of the four common verbs — 
?/r5-ian, wes-an, nyrw-an, and seoth-an: iras-oi, 
macerare, coarctare, coquere. 



134 OF ABSTRACTIOJT. 

East is yrs-ed, yrsd, yrst (dropping the r), yst. 
Those who cannot pronounce r, supply its place by 
a ; and hence east, meaning angry, enraged. 

[In the early version of the Wiclif Bible, we 
find " The wind TifFonyk, that is cleped north-eest, 
or wind of tempest,"^^ — Deeds, 27, 14.] 

West, is wes-ed, wes'd, west, past participle of 
tces-Qji, to wet. 

Our North (see infra, ch. v.) is the third person 
singular of the Anglo-Saxon verb, nyrw-an, but 
the nord and norr (as our own sailors pronounce it) 
of the other European languages is the past par- 
ticiple of the same word, and means narrowed, con- 
strained. 

South is the past tense and past participle of 
seoth-an, to seethe. " Some (fysh) they sold, and 
some they soth, and so they lined." — Piers Plough- 
man^ s Vision. Hence also the French sud; and 
our sod, sodden, suds. And the yesty waves, are 
the angry, stormy waves: Anglo-Saxon Ystig, 
lestig, procellosus. 

Geave. Grove : the Anglo-Saxon graf, grasf, 
serve for either. They and also groove are past 
tense, and therefore past participles of Graf-axi, to 
dig, to excavate, to cut or carve into. 

Grove : cut through a thicket of trees. 

Graft (sometimes graff) is graf-ed, graPd, graft. 

Grot, from graft (a broad) with / suppressed. 
Italian grotto, grotta. 

Green, Grey. See Brown^, supra. 

Hank, Haunch, Hinge, are the same word, 
with the common interchange of k, ch, or ye, from 
Anglo-Saxon Hang-an, to hang. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 135 

To have a hank, is to have something hank, 

hankyd, hanged or hung, on any person or thing. 

Haunch ; the part by which the lower limbs are 

hankyd or hanged to the body. French hanche, 

Italian anca. 

Hinge ; that on which the door is hung, heng, 
hyng, or hynge ; so variously is the word written 
in our old language. " The body hankyd on the 
cross." " He hyng down his head." " He henge 
on the lefte syde of our Lord." " He hynge on 
the ryght syde." 

[To Hanker is to hang about ; loitering as un- 
willing to quit; desirous to keep or get]. 

Harlot is merely horelet, diminutive of hore 
or whore. So the Latin meretrix, a merendo. 
Variety* and modern valet for hireling, are believed 
to be the same word ; the aspirate being changed 
to V and the r dropped ; as Lord is now frequently 
pronounced, especially at the Bar, Lod or Lud. 

Harlot is in old authors constantly applied to a 
hired servant, a hireling, without any imputation. 
Heal. Past participle of the Anglo-Saxon 
verb Hel-an, tegere ; to cover, to conceal. In old 
English, to hele, and to hil, are very common both 
literally and metaphorically — to cover, to recover. 
" Nile ye be bisy with what ye shulen be hilid.^^ 
—Matt. vi. 31. 

" We women can no thing hele,^'' — Wife of Bath. 
" The child was heeled (sanatus est) fro that 
our.''— Matt. 8. 



* " Thou hast not been, as an harlot, in that thou scornest hire." 
■Ezek. xvi. 31. 



138 OF ABSTRACTION. 

Ray says, " To heal, to cover. Suss. As to 
heal the fire, to heal a house ; to heal a person in 
bed, that is, to cover them, from the Anglo-Saxon 
hel-2in, to hide, cover, or heal. Hence in the west, 
he that covers a house with slates, is called a healer, 
or hillier." South and East country words. 

[And in his North-country words, A bed-AeaZ- 
272^ is a coverlet ; or absolutely a hyUing.] 

Hell. Any place, or some place covered over ; 
[Who shal go doun to depnesse or helle (in abys- 
sum.) — Rom. x. 7.] 

[Hell has various applications, namely, to 

1. An obscure place in any of our prisons. 

2. The place under the shopboard into which a 
tailor throws his shreds. 

3. A place under the Exchequer Chamber, 
where the king's debtors were confined. 

Also the place or hole to which those who were 
caught in the game of Barley-Break were brought.] 

Heel ; that part of the foot that is covered by the 
leg. 

Hill ; any heap of earth or stone, &c. by which 
the plain or level surface of the earth is covered. 
" Thei shulen bigynne to seie to litil hillis, hile ye 
us." — Luke xxiii. 30.* 

Hale, that is, healed or whole. 

Whole ; formerly written hole. A wound or 
sore is healed or whole, that is covered by the skin. 
[Hence whole-some, or hole-some]. To re-cover is 
our ordinary expression. 

* The learned Swedish etymologist, Ihre, says, " Angl. hilly 
ab hssla, tegere." 



OF ABSTKACTION. 137 

Hall ; a covered building, where persons as- 
semble, or wliere goods are protected from the 
weather. 

Hull of a nut, &c. ; that by which the nut is 
covered. And see Serenius. 

Hull of a ship ; that part which is covered in the 
water. 

Hole : some place covered over [a place for con- 
cealment or protection]. 

" You shall seek for holes to hide your heads in." 

Holt, holed, hol'd, holt ; a rising ground or knoll 
covered with trees. (And see Serenius.) 

Hold of a ship ; in which things are covered, or 
the covered part of a ship. (Ubi penus navis con- 
ditur. — Skinner.) 

Lace and Latch : past tense and past participle of 
Anglo-Saxon Lsecc-an, Lsecgan, Lasccean, prehen- 
dere, apprehendere, to hold, to take hold, to catch. 

" His hatte hinge at his backe by a laceJ'^ (Some 
ed. las.) a T. v. 16042. 

The latch of a door, or that by which a door is 
caught, latched or held, is often called a catch. 
[The latchet of whose shoes, is in AViclif, the 
thwong, that is, thong.] Tooke is persuaded that 
the Latin laqueus, and Italian laccio, are from the 
same Anglo-Saxon verb. 

Luck (good or bad) is (something, any thing) 
caught. He has had good luck; that is, he has 
had a good catch. 

L(Ecc-an is also written with the common prefix 
ge; as ge-lcBcc-an, and ge-latch (the g into c 
combining easily in rapid pronunciation with the 



138 OF ABSTRACTION. 

liquid Z) becomes clutch, with the same meaning, 
to catch, to seize ; and so Clutches, that is, clutch- 
ers (ge-latchers), 2^^ fangs 2indi Jingers fvoia fang-sna., 
and hand from hent-Sin. 

Lid and Lot, in Anglo-Saxon Mid, and hlot, 
though seemingly of such different significations, 
have but one meaning — covered, hidden. By- 
change of characteristic letter T, to i short, and to 
(as writ, wrote), they are the regular past tense 
and past participle of Anglo-Saxon hlid-an, to 
cover. And the English lid is that by which any 
thing (box, vessel, &c.) is covered. 

Lot is (any thing, something) covered, hidden. 
Witches were in foretime named lot-teUers, that is, 
tellers of covered or hidden things. 

[From the Greek K\y]ooQ, — a fragment of any 
thing (sc.) cast into the urn or vessel, — (rendered 
by our translators Lot^ the clergy are called. On 
choosing an apostle in lieu of Judas, and the 
choice was between Barnabas and Matthias; "they 
(the other apostles) gave forth theyr lottes (kXtj- 
^ovq), and the lot (o kXyi^oq) fell on Matthias." — 
Acts i. 26.] 

Hlid-an (as Lasccan) was also written with the 
prefix ge, and the no less common prefix he ; both 
of which easily united in pronunciation with the 
liquid I. 

Be-hlod or he-hlot (from be-hliden) became our 
English hlot, and a hlot on any thing extends as far 
as the thing is covered and no farther. 

Ge-hlyd, ge-hlod, ^e-AZ^c? (ge-hled-an), is become 
our glade ; applied to a spot covered or hidden with 
trees. In like manner as lot and hlot. 



OF ABSTKACTION". 139 

Cloud: from the same participle (it is supposed), 
thus : gehlod, or gehloud, gloud, cloud. So the 
Latin nuhes, from nubere ; " Nubes coelum ob- 
nubit ; a nuptu, that is, opertione : i quo nuptias 
nuptusque dictus." — Varro, 1. 4. [The bride (nu- 
bita, nubta, nupta) was so called, because when 
led to be married she was covered with a veil. 
^' A married woman in our law, French, is called 
a ^QvaQ-covert, foemina viro co-operta ; and is said 
to be covert-h^iYOTi, or under the protection and 
influence of her husband, her baron, or Lord." — 
Black, i. c. 15.] 

Lock and Block : Anglo-Saxon loc, he-loc are 
the regular past participles of Lyc-an, he-lyc-an, to 
shut up, close up, obstruct. [A block-head; 
having a head like a block (of wood) ; or whose 
faculties are blocked up.] 

Loaf, Dough, Bread. These words are ap- 
plied to the same material substance in different 
states. 

Bread has been explained to be brayed grain 
(ante, p. 118). 

Dough is the past participle of the Anglo-Saxon 
verb deaw-i2in., to moisten, to wet; and means 
wetted (dewed or bedewed). 

Loaf (in Anglo-Saxon hlaf, a broad) is the past 
participle of hlifian, to raise (to lift). Bread wet- 
ted becomes dough, and by the addition of the 
leaven it becomes loaf. This leaven is in Anglo- 
Saxon called hcef and haf-en. [Anglo-Saxon hcsf, 
fermentum, leaven ; so called from its quality of 
heaving or rising. — Somner.~\ 



140 or ABSTRACTIOIf. 

Loaf is in Mgeso-Gothic, hlaihs ; past participle 
of hleibyan, to raise. 

LoED, anciently written Uaf-ord, composed of tlie 
same hlaf, raised; and ord, ortus, source, origin, 
birth ; and means therefore high-hor7i, or of an ex- 
alted origin. 

Lofty and Lady are the same word, and mean 
merely raised, elevated. The two words are thus 
traced : 

The Anglo-Saxon hlaf, hlafod, hlafd, hlafdig, 
are in Enghsh, (omitting the /*,) laf, lafed, lafd, 
llafd-y (the Anglo-Saxon termination ig softened 
into y). Retaining the f, pronunciation requires 
the d to be changed into t, and the word becomes 
lofty (a broad, that is, aiu) or lofty. Suppress the 
f, the d may remain unchanged, and the word be- 
comes lady. 

Lady, then, in Anglo-Saxon hlafd or hlafd-ig, is 
merely lofty, that is, raised or exalted ; following 
the condition of her husband. 

Lift is hfed (Anglo-Saxon hlifod), lif 'd, lift; ob- 
tained by adding the termination od or ed to past 
tense ; Lf, Anglo-Saxon hlif. 

Loft is lafed (that is, lawfed), laf 'd, loft, by the 
same addition to the past tense, Hlcsf lawf. 

Many is called a strange word, and its history 
is certainly singular. 

Lowth observes that many is used " chiefly with 
the word great before it ; " and Johnson supposes 
feio and many to be opposite terms, and so indeed 
in usage they are. But G. Douglas writes, they 
were in number " ane few men3e, but quyk and 



i 



OF ABSTRACTION. 141 

val3eaiit in war." " A much more many." — Spen- 
ser, On Ireland. " How lie might find a moost 
meynee." — Piers Ploughman, Y. 5789. 

[In the translation of the Bible by Wiclif and his 
followers, " His household meynee," is in the Latin, 
" domestici ejus;" and "his meyneal church," 
domestica ecclesia; and meyneals, " domestici." 
And it is perhaps from this limited application of 
the word to those employed about the house, that 
our old lawyers have long derived it from intra 
mosnia, and this etymology was lately given by a 
learned Baron in the Court of Exchequer. But 
in not one of the above instances from P. Plough- 
man, Douglas, and Spenser, did the meynee consist 
of persons " intra m^nia." 

The Meynee, or many, of our ancestors consisted 
of a company of knights, esquires, and gentlemen, 
who accompanied their king or liege not only on 
occasions of ceremony, but to the field of battle. 
These also had their manye or menials ; and so in 
descending succession, till at length the word me- 
nial became restricted to the lowest class ; to those 
who performed household services, servile offices. 

Cotgrave writes the old French word mesnie, 
and Rochefort gives nearly forty different ways of 
writing it. The French etymologists derive it from 
maison, mansio, but it is an old Gothic word com- 
mon to the Northern languages : and our own lexi- 
cographer. Skinner, decided on the German men- 
gen, to mix, to mingle, as its true source ; in Anglo- 
Saxon Meng-an.] Of this last, the Anglo-Saxon 
meng-an, Tooke concludes it (our menye or many) 



142 OF ABSTRACTION. 

to be tlie past participle, and to mean mixed or as- 
sociated (for that is the effect of mixing), subaud. 
company, or any uncertain and unspecified number 
of things. 

" Many a message, many a youth, and many a 
maid," are corrupt usages. They should be, " a 
many of messages, o/* youths, o/* maids." " Multos 
sanctorum," Wiclif writes, " Manye of seyntes." — 
Acts i. 26. Bishop Gardner ; " A many o/* words." 
The word was, no doubt, very early applied as 
Lowth and Johnson explain. 

MoEROW, Morn, Morning, are traced back 
to the old English morewe, morewn, and more- 
wende. In the next stage back, the Anglo-Saxon, 
the words were written Merien, merg-en, merne, or 
margen, marne, or morr, morgen, morn : " And I 
believe them to be the past tense and past parti- 
ciple of the Gothic and Anglo-Saxon verb Meryan, 
merr-an, mirran, myrran, to dissipate, to disperse, 
to spread abroad, to scatter." 

By the customary change of z or y to o, morr is 
the regular past tense of myrran ; and morr (in 
order to express the latter r) might well be pro- 
nounced and written morwe, morewe. And it was 
so written by Wiclif; afterwards morowe and 
morrow.* By adding the participial termination, 
en, to the past tense morr or morew, we have more- 
wen, morewn, mor'n, according to the accustomed 
contraction. 

Morrow without, and Morn with, the participial 

* Such change, as morwe in morrow, is not uncommon ; thus, 
arwe, arrow ; narwe, narrow ; sorwe, sorrow, &c. &c. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 143 

termination ^w^have both the same meaning, namely, 
dissipated, dispersed, with clouds or darkness un- 
derstood; whose dispersion (or the time of their 
dispersion) it expresses. 

Anglo-Saxon myrrende is the regular present 
participle of myrran ; in old English, morewende, 
and so written in Wiclif; where is also found 
morwe-tid, that is, tide or time of dispersing dark- 
ness, which was anciently supposed to be some- 
thing positive. By the constant change of the 
Anglo-Saxon participial termination ende into ing, 
morewende became morewing, morwing, morning. 
Such expressions as the following are cited in con- 
firmation of this being the meaning : — 

" In the morning, afore day, he mette his horse, 
and rode till it was day." 

" You shall rise earely in the morne, or the day 
begin." 

" The morning dawes or dawns," (lucescit) — 
^^ scatters the rear of darkness." 

And see infra. Mirth, quod dissipat (subaud. 
mcEstitiarrt) and murther (quod dissipat), what mars 
(subaud. vitam.) 

Notch, nocke, nook, niche, nick, though so va- 
riously written, present at once a common mean- 
ing, from the verb to nick, incidere. 

Ope, by change of characteristic y into o, is the 
regular past tense of ypp-an, aperire, pandere ; and 
open, by adding the termination en, is the past par- 
ticiple. 

Gap and Gape are the past tense and past parti- 
ciple of ge-yppan (by change of y into a). 



144 OF ABSTRACTION. 

Chap and Chaps differ merely by pronouncing 
ch instead of ^. 

Pack, Patch, and Page. Patch, in both its 
applications, namely, to men or to clothes, are af- 
firmed to be the same past participle pac (differ- 
ently pronounced and written, with k, ch, or ge) of 
the Anglo- Saxon Pcec-an, pcecc-ean, to deceive by 
false appearances, imitation, resemblance, sem- 
blance, or representation ; to counterfeit, to delude, 
to illude, to dissemble, to unpose upon. (A pri- 
mary meaning is not given ; Lye merely says, de- 
cipere, mentiri.) 

Pageant is (by a small change of pronunciation) 
merely the present participle paecceande, pacheand, 
pacheant, pageant. 

Pish and Pshaw are the Anglo- Saxon pasc, 
p^cca, pronounced pesh, pesha {a broad), and are 
equivalent to trumpery, that is, tromperie, from 
tromper, to deceive. 

As Patch was applied to men, so was patchery 
applied to their conduct ; and as servants were con- 
temptuously called harlot, varlet, valet, or knave, 
so were they also called pack, patch, and page. 

Shakespeare writes, " Thou scurvy patch;" "A 
crew of jDatches ; " " You hear him, coz, see him 
dissemble, know his gross patchevj.'^ And Fabian, 
who wrote earlier, " Noughty packes, disguised in 
Byshoppes Apparel." 

They who put patches on a little breach, to hide 
it, are careful that the colour shall as nearly as 
possible resemble that upon which they put it. 

A Page of honour, comparatively with other 



OP ABSTRACTION. 145 

pages, was no doubt a post of honour, but in Dives 
and Pauper it is written, " The Kyng hath power 
and fredom of a page to make a yoman, of a yoman 
a gentylman, of a gentylman a knight;" placing 
the page at the bottom of all. 

Even now, it may be observed, a gentleman's 
valet, among servants, is comparatively, as the page 
of honour, looked upon as of higher rank than some 
others. 

Pond, Pound. To pin or to pen (a common 
English word) is the Anglo-Saxon pyndan, inclu- 
dere, to close in, and the past participle is pond, 
pound, pen, pin, bin (and the old Latin henna, a 
close carriage). 

A Pond, in which water, and in it, fishes are 
enclosed. 

A Pound, in which beasts, trespassing, are en- 
closed or shut in. 

A Pen or Pin, in which sheep, fowls, &c. are 
shut in ; any thing which encloses ; a pin or web in 
the eye, because it closes the eye. A merry pin, 
from the custom of drinking in mugs with a pin 
fixed, as a measure of the exact quantity to be 
drunk. A pin is still used for a small barrel, hold- 
ing or enclosing so much beer — (four-and-a-half 
gallons). 

Bin (by change of p into h), for corn, wine, &c. 

Rack is the past tense and past participle of the 
Anglo- SaxonRec-an, exhalare, to reek ; and whether 
written rak, wraich, reck, rock (as in G. Douglas), 
or reeke (as in Shakespeare), is the same word, with 
the same meaning ; that which is reeked, exhaled, 



146 OF ABSTEACTION. 

evaporated. A reek with us (says Mr. Kay) signi- 
fies not a smoak, but a steam, arising from liquor or 
moist thing heated (for example, a dunghill). 
" The winds in the upper regions which move the 
clouds (which we call the racK) and are not per- 
ceived below, pass without noise." — Bacon, Nat, 
Hist. § 115. 

" According to Bacon (says Dr. Jamieson), the 
rack denotes the thin vapours in the higher region 
of the air, which may either be moved by the winds, 
or stand still." 

" They must needs conceit that (in death) our 
substance is in a manner wet, and nothing but a 
tenuous reek remains." — H. More, On the Soul, 
b. 3. c. 2. 

Rack or Reek denotes vapours in the lower, — 
in any region. A reek or racke, from a newly- 
ploughed field, from a meadow, a pond or river, 
are common expressions in the Northern counties. 

The commentators, I fear, are not yet unani- 
mous that racke in the Tempest (iv. 1.) means 
vapour ; yet Avith such meaning it " is surely the 
most appropriate term that could be employed by 
Shakespeare in that passage, to represent to us 
that the dissolution and anniliilation of the globe 
and aU which it inherit, should be so total and 
complete, that they should so ' melt into ayre, into 
thin ayre,^ as not to leave behind them even [a 
tenuous reek], a vapour, a steam, an exhalation, to 
give the slightest notice that such things had ever 
been." 

Some would read wreck, which cannot be appli- 
cable to any thing " melted into ayre.^"* 



OF ABSTKACTIOX. 147 

Rack, Rake, Reck, a rack or rick of hay, and 
a rake, the tool or instrument by which the hay is 
collected, are the past participles Gothic of Ricjan, 
to draw together. 

Rich and Riches {k as usual into ch) are the 
same past participles ; the French Riche and rich- 
esse, and Italian Ricco and richezza (our ifc A, changed 
in pronunciation to sh and K), The word applies 
equally to any thing collected, accumulated, heaped, 
or, as we frequently express it, raked together. 

Rogue, Rook, Ray, &c. 

The Anglo-Saxon Wrig-an, to wrine, to wrie 
(not uncommon in Chaucer), to cover, to cloak, by 
change, in forming the past tense, of i into o and 
also into a, has furnished us with a variety of words 
very differently applied. The verb itself still sur- 
vives in to Rig. 

Rogue means covered, cloaked, applied to one 
who has cloaked or covered designs; and Tooke 
says that Ray, used by Gr. Douglas, is in this sense, 
but Dr. Jamieson remains in doubt. 

Rock, the part of the machine used by spin- 
sters covered by the wool. 

Rock in the sea, so called because covered or hid- 
den by the water [masses of like substance on the 
coast, left uncovered by the secession of waters, or 
of similar substance and appearance on land, have 
the same name]. 

Rocket or Rochet, the diminutive of rock; 
that with which women or bishops are covered. 

[On the past participle rock was formed the old 
Enghsh verb to rock, rook, rouk, or rack. Chau- 



148 



or ABSTRACTIOISJ'. 



cer writes, " O false murdered, rucking In tliy den." 
" The sliepe that rouketh in the fold." Covering, 
lying close in concealment, — under protection; 
and Gower, " But now they rucken in her nest, 
and resten." 

RoKETT in Berner's Froissart, " To ran with ro- 
liettes!^ "speares, either sharp or rokettes,^^ appears to 
have been a spear, with its point or head covered, to 
prevent injury, as the point of a fencing foil now is. 

To Rook is also to rogue, to play the rogue. 

Bug, Anglo-Saxon Booc {oo into u), is that with 
which a bed, a horse, &c. are covered. 

Buck is commonly used when some part of silk, 
linen, &c. is folded over or covers some other part, 
when the whole should lie smooth or even. 

Bay, or, with the common prefix a, array, 
means covered, dressed, and is applied both to the 
dressing of the body of an individual, and to the 
dressing of a body of armed men. Surrey, address- 
ing Virtue, asks, " Why art thou poorely raide ? " 
that is, rigged, clothed, dressed. 

Bail, Anglo-Saxon Bseg-el, is the diminutive of 
rcEg. [Wiciif writes it loriel, in the Latin Vulgate, 
velamen.] As a woman's night-r^zY, with which 
she is thinly covered. 

Bails ; by which any area, court-yard, or other 
place is thinly (that is, not closely, but with small 
intervals) covered. 

Bail or Bally ; to jest with a covert meaning, 
and hence raillery. To rail is now by custom ex- 
tended to abuse coarsely and violently. 

To Big a ship, and the riggen (now rigging), An- 
glo-Saxon wriggen. The latter is that with which 



OF ABSTEACTION. 149 

a ship or any thing else is rigged or covered. [Rig- 
gish (Shakespeare) is roguish. A rig, a roguish 
trick.] 

Room, Rim, and Brim, are the past participles 
of Anglo-Saxon Rym-an, be-rym-an, to extend. 

Room, Anglo-Saxon Rum, is extended, place, 
space, extent. 

" There was no room for them in the Inn." 

Luke ii. 7. 

In Wiclif 's Bible the earlier version has, " there 
was not place to hym in the comyn stable." The 
Anglo-Saxon is rum and Gothic rumis. 

[Hence our common word rummage, formerly 
written roomage ; we should now say stowage. 
The old usage is well shown in the following pas- 
sages from Hackluyt. 

*^ And that the masters of ships do look well to 
the romaging''"' (^placing the cargo), "for they might 
bring away a great deale more than they doe, if 
they would take paine in the romaging.^'' — Voyages, 
V. i. p. 308. 

" Now whilest the mariners were romaging the 
shippes, and mending that which was amisse, the 
miners, &c." Id. lb. v. 3, p. 88. 

^^ The master must provide a perfect mariner, 
called romager, to raunge and bestow the merchaun- 
dize in such place as is convenient." — Id. lb. v. 3, 
p. 862. 

To rummage now is to search into any room or 
place, with little regard for arrangement.] 

Rim is the utmost extent in breadth of any thing. 

Brim (be-rym-an) ; the extent of the capacity of 
any vessel. 



150 OF ABSTEACTIOX. 

A large-brim^d lake (Drayton) is widely ex- 
tended in breadth (Anglo-Saxon be-rynuned). 

Sheer, Sheed, Shred, &c. Sberd and sbred 
have already been explained among the past parti- 
ciples formed by the addition of ed to the verb to 
sheer, Anglo-Saxon Scyran.* The following are 
past particij)les of the same verb, by change of 
characteristic. 

Sheer, as we now use it, means separated; ^' Sheer 
ignorance," that is, separated from any the smallest 
mixture of information. In Beaumont and Flet- 
cher, " I had my feather shot shaer (that is, sheer) 
away;" so se^^arated by the shot as not to leave the 
smallest particle behind. [And in Dibdin's memo- 
rable song, " Here, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom 
Bowling."] 

Shore, as the sea-shore or shore of a river, re- 
lates merely to the separation of land from the sea or 
river ; not a determined spot of any size or shape. 

Short is shored, shor'd, short, cut off; opposed 
to long, which means extended, and is the past par- 
ticiple of the Anglo-Saxon verb Leiig-mn, to extend 
or stretch out. 

Shirt and skirt (thsd is, scired^ is the same parti- 
ciple differently written and applied. 

Shower (Anglo-Saxon Scyur and scur) means 
broken, divided, separated (clouds). [Junius, Skin- 
ner and Wachter agree that a shower consists of 
drops of water broken from the clouds.] 

Score, a piece cut off (a talley) containing twice 
ten notches; and thus a reckoning by scores or 

* Supra, p. 120. 



OF ABSTKACTION". I5l 

pieces cut off; a score or account kept by cuts or 
notches in pieces of wood or stick. Such is the 
etymology of Skinner. 

Shake ; any part or portion separated. 

Shire ; a separated part or portion of this realm. 

Scar, though now applied only to the cicatrix 
or remaining mark of the separation, was formerly 
appHed to any separated part. Ray informs us, 
that the " cliffe of a rocke (that is, the cleaved part 
of it) is still called a scarred And in the proverb, 
*^ Slander leaves a score behind it," score is scar. 
Tot-sherds or -pot-shards are likewise called the 
■pot-scars or pot-shreds. 

Share -BONE ; the bone where the body is sepa- 
rated or divided. It is written schere by G. Douglas. 

Sheers and plow^-share ; contracted from 
sheerer, to avoid the repetition er. 

The German, Dutch, Swedish, Danish, share 
this past participle in common with ourselves, and 
to the Italian scerre, sciarrare and schiera, and to 
the French a I'ecart and dechirer, the same North- 
ern origin is ascribed. 

■ Shot, Shotten. Here we have a very nume- 
rous family, all from the Anglo-Saxon sceat, past 
participle of the Anglo-Saxon and English verb 
Scytan, scit-an, to shete or shut ; variously written 
with a or a broad, ou, oo, or u, or i short (jacere, 
projicere, dejicere, to throw, cast forth, throw out). 

A Shot from a gun, bow, or other machine; 
something cast or thrown forth. 

A Shot window; a window thrown out, pro- 
jected beyond the rest of the front. 

Shot or Scot; "A shot of five pence," that is. 



152 OF ABSTRACTION". 

five pence cast or thrown down, Scot and shot are 
intercliano-eable. 

A Shotted herring ; a herring that has cast or 
thrown forth its spawn. 

Shoot of a tree (Italian schiatta) ; that which a 
tree has cast or thrown forth. 

Shout, a sound thrown forth from the mouth. 
[And see Tell in yv. tall, &c.) 

Shut, pronounced by the common people shet, 
and anciently written also with the vowels i and y. 
To shet the door is merely to thi^ow or cast the door 
to. To get shut of a thing means, to get a thing 
thrown off or cast from us. 

Shuttle or Shittle (shut-del, shit-del) means 
a small instrument shot, that is, thrown or cast. 

A SnuTTLE-cork or SniTTLE-cork is a cork 
thrown or cast (backward smd forward). 

Sheet, of a bed, of water, of lightning, of paper ; 
thrown or cast or spread. A sheet was formerly 
written shote anchor, an anchor throicn for security ; 
it is applied metaphorically to our main stay or se- 
curity. 

The Anglo-Saxon sc, being pronounced both as 
sh and sc, we have thus, scot (ante), scoat, scate, 
and skit. 

A Scout ; one sent out before an army to collect 
intelligence by any means; at cricket, to return 
the ball. 

[To Scout ; to cast off, to reject] 

A Skit ; a familiar word in speech for a jibe or 
jeer thrown or cast on any one. To the same effect, 
2i fling. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 153 

Sketch (Dutch schefs), thrown off; requn-ing 
to be afterwards finished. 

Sagitta (pronounced Sag-hitta), skit, skita, sa- 
kita, sagita ; something cast, thrown, that is, shot. 

To Itahan Scotto, schiatta, schizzo ; French es- 
cot, ecot, esquisse ; Dutch schets ; the same origin 
is ascribed. 

Our Author enlarges on the fruitless efforts of 
the Italian and French etymologists to discover the 
origin of these words, and the following observa- 
tions well describe the causes to which he attri- 
buted their failure. 

Our modern etymologists become surrounded 
with difficulties, because they direct their attention 
to the East and not to the North. " They seem 
to foro-et that the Latin is a mere modern lano;uao;e, 
compared with the Anglo-Saxon. The Roman 
beginning (even their fable) is not, comparatively, 
at a great distance. The beginning of the Roman 
language we know, and can trace its formation step 
by step. But the Northern origin is totally out 
of sight, is entirely and completely lost in its deep 
antiquity." " The bulk and foundation of the 
Latin language most assuredly is Greek, but great 
part of the Latin is the language of our Northern 
ancestors grafted upon the Greek.* And to our 
northern language the etymologist must go for 
that part of the Latin which the Greek will not 
furnish ; and there, without any twisting or turn- 



* We find in the Latin, as nouiis, many of our past participles, 
and yet not the verbs to which those participles belong. 



154 OF ABSTRACTION". 

ing or ridiculous forcing and torturing of words, lie 
wiU easily and clearly find it. We want, there- 
fore, tlie testimony of no historians to conclude, 
that the founders of the Roman State and the La- 
tin tongues came not from Asia, but from the north 
of Europe. For the language cannot lie. And 
from the language of every country we may with 
certainty collect its origin. In the same manner, 
even though no history of the fact had remained, 
and though another Virgil and another Dionysius 
had again, in verse and prose, brought another 
^neas from another Troy to settle modern Italy, 
after the destruction of the Roman Government; 
yet, in spite of such false history or silence of his- 
tory, we should be able, from the modern lan- 
guage of the country (which cannot possibly lie), 
to conclude with certainty that our Northern an- 
cestors had again made another successful irrup- 
tion into Italy, and again grafted their own lan- 
guage upon the Latin, as before upon the Greek. 
For all the Italian which cannot be easily shown 
to be Latin, can be easily shown to be our north- 
ern language."* 

It would indeed have been in an incalculable 
degree useful to the learned world, guiding the 
steps and saving the labour of succeeding philolo- 
gers, if the author of the ETrea UrepoEVTa, and Mr. 
Gilbert Wakefield, had accomphshed what they 
had agreed to undertake in conjunction, namely, a 
division and separation of the Latin tongue into 
two parts, placing together in one division all that 

* See Diversions of Purley, v. pp. 140, 270. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 155 

could be clearly shown to be Greek, and in the 
other division all that could be clearly shown to be 
of northern extraction. 

Skill, Scale ; another long list, with the same 
changes of characteristic and interchange of sc and 
sh, as in shot, scot, and seeming to have little in 
sound and less in meaning common with each other, 
yet all are the past participles of the Anglo-Saxon 
verb Sci/l-siii, to divide, to separate, to make a dif- 
ference, to discern, to skill, and have one common 
meaning. 

The verb to skill was in common use down to 
the reign of Charles the First : " It skills not ; 
that is, it makes no difference." 

Skill is discernment ; the faculty by which things 
are ^ro^Qvlj divided and separated one from another. 

Scale, shale, shell, shoal or shole, scowl, scull, 
are different forms of the same word. 

We have Scale, a ladder, and thence scale, of a 
besieged place [by mounting the separate steps; 
and to scale, generally to climb, to mount]. 

A pair of Scales [for the separation of portions 
by weight]. 

A Scale of degrees. 

Scale of a fish, or of our own diseased skin. 

Scale of a bone. 

ScALL and scaled (or scald) head. 

Shale or shell of a nut, &c. 

Shoal, shole, or skul of fishes. 

Scull of the head. 

Scowl of the eyes. 

Shoulder (formerly written shoulde) [where 
arm is separated from the body or trunk]. 



156 OF ABSTRACTION. 

Skill, sMlling, slate. 

Fishes come in shoals, sholes, or sTtuls ; that is, 
in separate divisions or parts divided from the main 
body ; and any one of these divisions (these shoals 
or sculs) may be again scaled ; that is, divided or 
separated by the belching whale. 

" And there they flye or dye, like scaled sculs 
before the belching whale." — Troylus and Cressida. 

In Measure for Measure, " The corrupt deputy 
was scaled, by separating from him, or stripping off 
his covering of hypocrisy." 

In Coriolanus, the tale of Menenius was " scaled 
a little more, by being divided more into particulars 
and degrees told more circumstantially." 

In the same play ; " Scaling his present bearing 
with the past," separating or looking separately, 
distinguishing the one from the other. 

An old sack is always skailing, that is, parting, 
dividing, separating, breaking. 

To Sheal milk ; to separate the parts, to curdle 
it. — Ray. 

To Scale ; to spread as manure, &c. Used in 
the North. — Grose. 

To Skale or Skail; to scatter and throw 
abroad, as mole-hills are when levelled. — Id. 

Scowl. Our ancestors said Sceol-eage ; we say 
only sceol, that is, scoiol, subaud. eyes ; that is, se- 
parated eyes, or eyes looking different ways. 

Shilling ; one of the (twenty) parts into which 
a pound is divided or separated. 

Slate, formerly written sclat, skalit, sklait, 
eklate, slate ; Scotch schelbzis, Dutch schalien. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 157 

" And by the sclattis (tegulas) they letten him 
down." — Wic. Luke v. 19. 

The Italian Scala, scaglia, scalogna, the French 
eschelle, escaille, eschalotte, and also their chaloir, 
nonchalance, and the Italian non cale, with the La- 
tin calliduSj are referred to the same origin. 

Slack, Slouch ; In Anglo-Saxon Slcec, sleac, 
slog, slcew, sleaw, slaw, same past participle of the 
Anglo-Saxon verb sleac-ian, sleacg-ian, slac-ian 
(« broad), tardare, remittere, relaxare, pigrescere. 
" The Greekes caryed the here with slake pace." 
— Chaucer, Knlghtes Tale, 

Slouch, sl^c {ch for k), a slow (pace). 

[A slouch : " A foul great stooping slouch, with 
heavie eyes and hanging lip." — H, More.'] 

Slough, slog (^gh for ch^, slow water. 

Slug, slog (^ for A), slow reptile. 

Slow, slaw (^w for ^). [" Reise ye slow hondis 
and knees unboundeen." — WiC. Heb. xii. 12, re- 
missas manus.] 

Slow-en, slouen, sloven, 

[" Some sluggish slovens that sleepe day and 
night. " — Skelton.~\ 

Slow-ed, slowed, slut 

Slut is applied by Gower and Chaucer to males, 
and it is so by Lord Berners also : — 

*^ Among these other of sloutes kinde .... 
There is yet one, whiche Idelness 
Is cleped." — Gower. 

«f Why is thy lorde so slotelyche, I the pray?" 
(Tyrw. sluttish.) — Chaucer, 

" He showed them all the nature of the Span- 



158 OF ABSTRACTION. 

yardes, how they be sluttish and lousy, and enuy- 
ous of other mannes welthe." — Berners, 

A Slow is used by Chaucer as we now use 
Sluggard. Sloio was used as a verb, for example, 
" Aqua vitae moderately given sloweth age; it 
str engtheneth youth. " — Holinshed. 

The Slough of an animal, the slough of a wound, 
that which (skin, scurf) sloweth, slacketh, looseth. 

Sloth is sloweth, slowth, sloth ; the third person 
indicative of the Anglo-Saxon Slaw-ian, to slow. 

SoEROW, Sorry, are by change of the charac- 
teristic y to 0, the past participle of the Anglo- 
Saxon verb Syrw-an, syrewan, syrewian, to vex, to 
molest, to cause mischief to. This past participle 
in Anglo-Saxon was very variously written sorw, 
sorice, &c. and in old English sorice, soreice, soor, 
&c.* It was and is the general name for any ma- 
lady or disease, or mischief or suffering ; any thing 
generally by which one is molested, vexed, grieved 
or mischieved. 

[In the later version of the Wiclif Bible (Matt. 
iv. 23), the Yulgate Latin, " omnem languorem," is 
rendered " every languor ; " but in the earlier, " al 
soroio or ache," and in v. 25, we have " dyuerse 
languores," and " dyuers soroAvis" (var. reading, 
soores") from " diversis languoribus."] 

" Judas was sorowe therof, and grutched." — 
Dives and Pauper. 

[" I am sorrow for thee." — Cymheline. 

We should now use sorry; and as Shakespeare 

* See ante, Morkow, p. 142, note. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 159 

writes " I am sorry" only a few lines above, it is 
very likely that he did so here, sorrow in such 
usage being obsolete.] 

Spenser uses sore as a verb ; to grieve, to lament. 

A sory maid, in Spenser, a grieved maid; a 
sory plight ; a plight in which he (Malbecco) was 
grieved, mischieved. 

Shrewd, not by change of characteristic, but by 
addino; ed to the indicative. It is An2:lo- Saxon 
syrw-ed, syrew-ed ; and syrwe, syrewe, is our mo- 
dern shrewe or shrew (by an easy corruption of y 
into h, as also in syrop, shrub), the indicative of 
shrew-Sin, and meaning one who vexes or molests. 
Shrew Avas formerly applied to males as well as 
females. [In Chaucer's translation of Boethius, 
pessimi, improbi, are rendered shrewde folke. In 
Wiclif " prava" is rendered " schrewed thingis, 
schrewed generation." 

" Nay then, quod she, I shrew us both two."— 
Wife of Bath, N. 6644. 

^^ And yet he was to me the most shrew. ''^ — Id. 
V, 6087.] 

Be-shrew thee; be thou (Anglo-Saxon) syrwe, 
syrewe, that is, vexed; or mayst thou be vexed, 
molested, mischieved, or grieved, in some manner. 

[" Now elles, frere, I will beshrewe thy face." — 
Id. 6426. 

Shrewed or shrewd; vexed, troubled, provoked ; 
and consequentially angry, ill-tempered, bitter or 
biting; and hence further, keen, cunning, saga- 
cious. 

A Sorry fellow, a sorry tale, case, or condition ; 



160 OF ABSTRACTION". 

a sorry fellow, tale, case, or condition, so mischieved 
as to appear of little worth ; contemptible or piti- 
able.] 

Stage, Stag. The Anglo-Saxon Stig-an, as- 
cendere, by usual change of characteristic vowel 
and cognate consonants, gives us these following 
words, so apparently unconnected. The verb, to 
stie^ now disused, was common with our best 
writers, from Piers Ploughman to Spenser. It was 
variously written steige, steye, sty or stie. 

1. Stage ; any elevated place, for comedians or 
other perfonners to exhibit: to scaffoldings or 
buildings raised for many other purposes. 

2. The word is applied to corporeal progress ; as 
at this stage of my journey — of the business — of 
my life. Travelling was called steigynge. 

3. It is also applied to degrees of mental ad- 
vancement in or towards any knowledge, talent or 
excellence. 

4. It was also used as we now use story. (French 
estage, etage). " Sleping he fell down fro the 
thridde stage.'^' (Modern Version loft.) 

Stag ; so called from his raised and lofty head ; 
his " high-palm'd head " being the most striking 
circumstance at the first sight of him. 

Stack; ofhay, of wood, of chimneys; chimneys 
raised (above the roof) ; hay or wood raised or 
piled up. 

Stalk (a broad). Spenser describes the pro- 
gress of seed to green grass, from green grass to 
the stalk, from stalk to ear, and thence the grain ; 
and, after mowing or reaping, binding into sheaves, 
and rearincr into stalks. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 161 

Stay; in Scotch^ a stay brae is a high bank. 
Rocbis full stay — very bigb rocks: stay, merely 
meaning steig, raised, high, lofty. 

Stair; Anglo-Saxon Sta3g-er; Dutch steiger; 
means merely an Ascender. Chaucer and Fabian 
wrote steyer, and stey. Fabian writes steyer for 
stager. 

Story, stag-ery, stay-ery (a broad), stawry or 
story ; a set of stairs. 

Sty, on the eye ; called by Skinner a tumour, 
from the Anglo- Saxon verb to stie. 

Sty, for hogs ; Anglo- Saxon stige, a raised pen, 
to keep hogs in cleanliness. 

A Stile; Anglo-Saxon stig-el, a diminutive of 
sty. 

Stirrup (etymologists concur), a mounting- 
rope, a rope by which to mount or stye ; Anglo- 
Saxon stig-rap. 

The low Latin Astraba, and strepa, and Span^ 
ish Estribo, are referred to the same origin. 

Stock, Stockings. The Anglo-Saxon Stoc, 
stak, sticce ; English Stok, stok-en, stuk, stak, stik, 
stich, are the differently spelled, pronounced and 
applied past tense, and past participle of the 
Anglo- Saxon verb Stic-an; stic-can,to5^zcA, figere, 
pungere. Om- modern custom acknowledges stuck 
only as the past tense and past participle; and con- 
siders all the others as so many distinct and un- 
connected substantives. 

« Take," says Mr. Trench,* '' the word ' stock;' 

* Lect. 6, on the Study of Words. 
M 



162 OF ABSTKACTION. 

in wliat an almost infinite number of senses it is 
employed. What point in common can we find 
between them all ? This : — that they are all de- 
rived from, and were originally, the past participle 
of ^ to stick,' which, as it now makes ^ stuck,' made 
formerly ^ stock,' and they cohere in the idea of 
Jixedness, which is common to every one." 

Stock, truncus, stipes, that is, stuck; to stand 
like a stock. See ante. Lock, Post. 

Stock, metaphorically; a stupid or blockish 
person. 

Stock, of a tree, itself stuck in the ground; 
from which branches proceed. 

Stock, metaphorically, stirps, family, race; 
[hence 5^oc^-dove, the stock or stirps of the domestic 
kinds.] 

Stock ; fixed quantity, or store of any thing. 

Stock in trade ; fixed sum of money, or goods, 
capital, fund. 

STOCK-lock ; a lock stuck in. 

Stock, of a gun; in which the barrel infixed 
or stuck. 

Stock, handle ; in which a tool or instrument 
is stuck. 

Stock, for the neck (or legs, see infra). 

Stockij^g, for the leg; corruptly written for 
stock-en ; because it was stuck pr made with stick- 
ing pins, now called knitting needles. 

Stock ; in which hands and legs are stuck, as 
a punishment. 

Stocks ; in which ships are stuck or fixed. 

Stocks ; where the money of persons is fixed; 
the public funds. 



OF ABSTEACTION. 163 

Stucco ; for houses, &c. a composition stuck or 
fixed upon walls, &c. 

Stake, in a hedge ; stak or stuck there. 
• [" I too have a stake (in the country) and a deep 
stake, nor stolen from the public hedge to be sure, 
for I planted it myself." — Home Tooke, in the 
House of Commons.] 

Stake ; any thing stuck or fixed in the ground, 
to which beasts may be fastened to be baited. 

Stake; a deposit, paid down, orjixed, to answer 
the event. And thus — 

Stake, metaphorically, a risk ; any ikmg fixed 
or eno-ao-ed to answer the event. 

Steak ; a piece or portion of flesh so small as 
that it may be taken up and carried, stuck upon a 
fork, or any other sticking instrument. 

Stick (formerly written Stoc) ; carried in the 
hand, or otherwise, but sufiiciently slender to be 
stuck or thrust into the ground or other soft sub- 
stances. 

Stick ; a thrust. 

Stitch (ch for k) ; a thrust or push with a needle, 
also that which is performed by such thrust or 
push. 

Stitch ; metaphorically, a pain resembling the 
sensation produced by a stitch, or by being stuck 
or pierced by any pointed instrument. 

Besides the above, still remaining in common 
use, there were formerly — 

Stock, for the leg ; now Stocking. 

" She can knit him a stocke.^^ — Two Gentlemen 
of Verona, 



164 OF ABSTRACTION. 

Stock ; a sword or rapier, or any weapon tliat 
might be tkrust or stuck. Also 

Stock and Stuck ; a thrust or push. 

" He gives me the stucke in with such a mortal 
motion, that it is eneuitable." — Twelfth Night, 

[Stoccado ; a thrust or push. Stoccade ; a 
fence of sharp stakes.] 

Stoker; one who sticks, — that which pushes 
and consequently stirs (the fire), a poker. 

^TiTC^-fallen cheek; metaphorically, from a 
stitch of needlework y«ZZe72. 

To the Italian stocco, stoccada, and French 
estoc, the same origin are ascribed. 

[ Chapman writes, " And many men at plow he 
made, and drave earth here and there, 

" And turn'd up stitches orderly." — Hiad, 18. 

These stitches were performed, made, effected, 
by the driving or pushing of the plough. 

^^ You have gone a good stitch ; you may well 
be aweary." — Bunyan. That is, a good way at one 
stitch or j)ush.] 

Store, Stour, as well as Stern,* are the past 
participles of the same Anglo-Saxon verb, Stir-an, 
to steer, to move. 

Store is a collective term for any quantity or 
number of things stirred or moved into some one 
place together. 

Stour (Anglo-Saxon Stur), formerly in much 
use, means moved, stirred, and was applied equally 
to dust, to water, and to men; all things easily 
moved. It is commonly so written in G, Douglas, 

* Ante, p. 122. 



OF ABSTRACTION-. 165 

is found in Chaucer and Spenser, and so late as 
Drayton. [ Ascliam writes stoorer, the comparative, 
more austere or harsh.] Sturt in G. Douglas, is 
stured, stur^d, sturt. 

A Start, and a Stir, or Stur, need no ex- 
planation. 

Sturdy (ig into y, and the French estourdi, 
etourdi) ; stirred, moved, sc. to exertion, endur- 
ance, resistance. 

Strain^, Stride : Strain is past tense and 
past participle, strined, strind, of the Anglo-Saxon 
Stryn~an, to get, gignere, procreare, acquirere. 
Chaucer and Spenser write streen or strene. (Tyr- 
whitt, stren.^ 

" For God it wote, that children ofte been 
Unlyke her worthy elders, hem before : 
Bounte cometh all of God, and not of the streen 
Of which they ben engendred and ibore." 

Clerkes Tale, v. 8033. 
Stride (the n dropped), called in Lincolnshire, 
says Skinner, a cock's S trine — Anglo-Saxon 
strynd. G. Douglas writes get, that is, begotten, 
in the same manner. The father of Camilla is said 
to have ofttimes pressed the milk of mares 
" Within the tender lippis of his get."^^ 
Yester-day is the Anglo-Saxon Gestran-dgeg, 
and gestran is the past tense and past participle of 
Gestrinan, to get, to acquire, to obtain. But a day 
is not gotten or obtained till it is passed, therefore 
gestran-dddg, is equivalent to the passed day. Ges- 
tran, Yestran, yestern (in German, gestern, Dutch 
gisteren), y ester. 



166 OF ABSTRACTIOlSr. 

Gestraii-di2dg, is Hesterna dies (Lye), and tlie 
Latin hestern-i\s is ghestern. [Whatever may be 
thought of the justice of this etymology, its ex- 
treme ingenuity is undeniable.] 

Hester n. [The modern Latin etymologists say 
hes, whence hesternus, and hesternus is analogous 
with Hodiernus. Hes they consider to be kindred 
with )(0£c j the old source of Hesternus.] 

Tall, Toll, are the past participles of the An- 
glo-Saxon verb, Til-ian, to lift up, to till (toll-ere). 

Tall and the French Taille, mean raised, 
lifted up. 

[Tall is applied metaphorically to men of high 
spirit, lofty courage. 

" I know your spirit to be tall ; pray be not 
vexed." — Beaumont and Fletcher. 

" Boadicea and her daughter ride about in a 
chariot telling the tall champeons as a great encou- 
ragement, that Avith the Britons it was usual for 
woemen to be their leaders." — Milton, History 
of England, b. 2.] 

Toll and the French Taille (which is taken 
of goods) differ only in pronunciation and spelling. 
It is a part lifted up ; as a tax, levied, raised. 

Toll of a bell is the bell lifted, and apphed to 
the sound thus caused. 

Tool, is (some, any instrument) lifted up, or 
taken up, to work with. 

Toil (for labour), applied perhaps at first prin- 
cipally to having tilled {lifted up) the earth, and 
then to other sorts of labour. Tooke produces two 
instances from a MS. version of the New Testa- 



OF ABSTRACTIOlSr. 167 

ment in Lis possession of the verb to toil, written 
in old English^ to tueill, and tuail. In the Wiclif 
Bible the word is trauil. 

Toil (for a snare) is any thing lifted up or 
raised for a snare. A spider's web is a toil (some- 
thing lifted up) to catch flies ; springes and nets, 
toils for other animals. 

[And I know no better etymology for the verb 
to tell, than this Anglo-Saxon tilian, or tal-ian, 
the Dutch taelen, numerare, narrare ; and I thus 
explain the word : — 

To lift or raise, sc. the articles to be counted, or 
calculated (the calculi), tossed or thrown, on the 
counter : and hence to count them, to number or 
enumerate, to reckon them. Also — 

To raise or lift, sc. the voice, the sound of the 
voice : and thus to utter, to narrate, &c. &c. What 
more common expression, when the speaker does 
not make himself heard, than " Tell it out;" " raise 
your voice." Hence tale and talk.'\ 

Towis^, Tun, Ten. Anglo-Saxon Ton, tone, 
tun, tyne, past tense, and past participle of the 
Anglo-Saxon verb Tynan, to enclose, to encompass, 
to tyne. (Somner, to teen.^ 

Town ; any number of houses enclosed together. 
Formerly the English subaudition was more ex- 
tensive, and embraced also any enclosure; any 
quantity of land, &c. enclosed. Dr. Beddoes wrote 
to Tooke that " in the west of Cornwall every 
cluster of trees is called a town of trees ; " that is, 
trees encompassed or within a certain compass. He 
adds, that " to tyne is still a provincialism." 



168 OF ABSTEACTION. 

[In tlie early version of the Wiclif Bible, " oc- 
cludens ostinm " is rendered " tyndynge to the 
dore;" in the latter, " closide the dore." And the 
Latin Villa, is usually rendered a toun ; " yillam 
emi — I have bougt a toun.''^ — Luke xiv. 18.] 

A tun (Anglo-Saxon Tunne) ; and its diminutive 
tunnel (Anglo-Saxon Tsenel) ; the former appUed 
to an enclosure of fluids, to the fluid enclosed, to 
a certain weight closed or packed together. 

[A Tui^N'EL ; any smaller enclosure, for smoke, 
in its passage out ; for liquor in its passage into a 
tun or other vessel. And some foreign birds are 
described by Derham as tunnelling their nests ; and 
suspending them from trees to keep them out of 
the reach of rapacious animals,] 

Ten (Anglo-Saxon Tyn, tin, ten) is the same 
past participle. The names of colours and winds 
have been shown to have a meaning, and the names 
of numerals have one also. The number of the 
fingers is the utmost extent of numeration ; and by 
them all numeration was performed. The hands 
doubled, closed or shut in, include and conclude all 
number. In counting more, you begin again, ten 
and one; ten and two, &c. to twain-ten^, &c. on 
to tioain-tens and one, &c. 

The Latin decern, Greek ^sKa, have been de- 
rived from ^e^EdOai, comprehendere : and Tooke 
approves. See Yossius, and Scheid in Lennep. 

Wile, Guile . . . The Anglo-Saxon Wigl-ian, 
ge-wigl-ian, be-wigl-ian, means to conjure, to di- 
vine, consequently to practise cheat, imposture, 
and enchantment. 



OF ABSTKACTION". 169 

Wile (from Wigl-ian), and ^we7e (from ge-wigl- 
ian), are that by which any one is deceived. 

Guilt, is Ge-wigled, guiled, guil'd, guilt; the 
past participle of ge-wigl-ian. To find guilt in any 
one, is to find that he has been guiled, or, as we 
now say, beguiled ; " that is," says Mr. Trench, 
" instigante diabolo — as it is inserted in all indict- 
ments for murder, the forms of which come down 
to us from a time when men were not ashamed of 
tracing evil to his inspiration." * 

Wicked means witched, or bewitched; and to 
pronounce guilt is to pronounce wicked. 

Gull is merely a person Guiled or beguiled. In 
gull there is no allusion to witchcraft. But guilt, 
being a technical law term, keeps its place in our 
legal proceedings, as the instigation of the devil 
does ; and with the same meaning. 

Wroth, Wrath, Wreath, are the past tense 
and past participles of the Anglo-Saxon Writh- 
an, torquere, to writhe, and speak for themselves. 

Raddle (supposed to be so pronounced for wrath- 
el, the diminutive of wrath) ; a raddle hedge, is a 
hedge of pleached or plashed, twisted or wreathed, 
twigs or boughs. 

So riddle, metaphorically ; and wrg so pro- 
nounced for writh. 

I here conclude my selection from the plentiful 
abundance of this chapter. The whole number of 
instances produced in it and the preceding chapters 
to establish the doctrine of past participles used 

* On the Study of Words, Lee, 6. 



170 OF ABSTRACTION. 

substantively^ that is, with a substantive (an ali~ 
quid) understood, amounts, as the author himself 
informs us, to about 1,000 words. But my selec- 
tion will present to the reader enough (and per- 
haps more than enough) to stimulate his curiosity 
to pursue, as far as his means and opportunities 
will enable him, the study at least of his own lan- 
guage, on the principles which it has been my task 
and my endeavour to explain and confirm. 

Mr. Trench enlarges, with great energy, on the 
advantages that will result from such pursuit, es- 
pecially by analysing groups of words with a view 
to detect their bond of relationship, and the one 
root Qut of which they grow ; and when one single 
word is found to be used in various senses, seem- 
ingly far removed from each other, of seeking out 
the bond which there certainly is between these 
several uses. This can only be done by getting to 
the seminal meaning of the word, from which, as 
from a fruitful seed, all the different usages unfold 
themselves. 

" From this," he proceeds, " we may start with, 
as lifted above all doubt (and the non-recognition 
of it is the ! great fault in Johnson's Dictionary,) 
that a word has originally but one meaning, and 
that all the others, however widely they may di- 
verge from one another, and seem to recede from 
this one, may yet be affiliated upon it, may be 
brought back to the one central meaning, which 
grasps and knits them altogether."* 

♦ On the Study of Words. Lee. 6. 



OF ABSTEACTION. 171 

He unhesitatingly entertains the doctrine of past 
participles, as leading to the accomplishment of 
the purposes above insisted upon as so desirable. 
*' What a multitude," he observes, " of our nouns, 
substantive and adjective, are, in fact, unsuspected 
participles, or are otherwise most closely connected 
with verbs, with which, notwithstanding, until 
some one points out the fact to us, we probably 
never think of putting them in any relation. And 
yet with how lively an interest shall we discover 
words to be of closest kin, which we had never 
considered till now but as entire strangers to one 
another. What a real increase it will be in our 
acquaintance with, and mastery of, English, to be- 
come aware of such relationship."* 

But the views of Home Tooke extended far 
beyond those which Mr. Trench has described. 
He concludes this chapter, so full of novelty, with 
saying — " On this subject of subaudition, I wiU 
exercise your patience no further; . . . But I 
trust these (words) are sufficient to discard that 
imagined operation of the mind, which has been 
termed abstraction, and to prove, that what we 
call by that name is merely one of the contrivances 
of language, for the purpose of more speedy com- 
munication." 

I now proceed to another class of words " most 
closely connected with verbs," indeed so closely as 
to form a part of them. 

* And see ante. Stock. 




172 

CHAP. Y. 

ON ABSTRACTION (continued). 

\_Ahstract terms formed from the third person sin- 
gular of the indicative'^, 

ALE ; in Anglo- Saxon AlofA, tliat is, quod ac- 
cendit^inflammat ; from <EZ-«?2,accendere,&c. 

" Ale, noble ale ; 

No liquor more preserves the natural heat." 

Howell. 

(See Yellow, supra, ch. iv.) 

Birth ; that which, or which any one beareifA. 
Anglo-Saxon bear-an. 

Broth; that, &c. briwe^A, breweth; briw-an, 
coquere. 

Breadth ; Length, &c. 

In the same manner are formed our words of 
admeasurement, length, breadth, loidth, depth, heigth 
(now written height), but by Milton, and our old 
authors, heigth ; the same change has taken place 
in many other words. See infra. Drought, Harm, 
Light, Might, Sight. They are respectively the 
third persons singular Len3eth, Braedeth, Wadeth, 
Dippeth, Heaf-eth of the indicatives of Len3ian, 
extendere ; Braedan, dilatare ; Wadan, procedere ; 
Dippan, submergere. 

Dearth ; that which, some or any season, wea- 



OF ABSTEACTION. 173 

ther, or other cause, which dereth, that is, maketh 
dear, hurteth or doth mischief, "that produceth 
scarcity or want." Anglo-Saxon der-ian, nocere, 
Isedere. The verb to dere was formerly in common 
use. Dere and deriend mean hurt and hurting ; 
mischief and mischievous. Dear, as consequence 
of being scarce, wanted, " precious, costly, highly 
prized or valued," &c. &c. Hence the Lat. Dims, 

Drought, Anglo-Saxon Drugo^A; formerly 
written docjeth, dr jth, and dri^A; Anglo-Saxon 
dryg-?in, excutere, expellere, and therefore siccare, 
to dry ; Hence also, Deain (Drsen), fluid (or other 
thing), excussum, expulsum, and the Deone (hee^, 
excussus, expulsus: Anglo-Saxon Dran, drane, 
dragn. 

Eaeth; that, &c. ereth, or eare^A, that is, 
plougheth; Anglo-Saxon er-ian, «r-are. JErd, 
used by Gr. Douglas and other old authors, is er-ed, 
erW, past participle, that which is ploughed, and 
tell-us, that which is tiU-ed ; Anglo-Saxon tiU-isLii ; 
Latin toll-ere. 

Faith ; Anglo-Saxon fddgth, formerly faieth ; 
that which one covenanteth or engageth ; foey-snij 
pangere, pay-ere, to engage, to covenant, to con- 
tract. Faith is, then, a pledge of fidelity ; sc. so 
to live or believe, and consequently that which we 
do or should believe, — as Christians, Mussulmen, &c. 
[The German fuff-en, fac-ere, preserves the ori- 
ginal meaning expressed by our old English word, 
to fay or fey ; smdfoeyth, a covenant, is an exten- 
sion of signification similar to that of deed, an act 
or fact, of covenant or agreement.] 



174 OF ABSTRACTION". 

Filth, tliat wMch file^A, or as we now write, 
defileth ; Anglo-Saxon Fyl-an. 

Girth, Gtarth ; that, &c. girde^A, gIrdVA, gir^A, 
and garth, used in some Northern counties for a 
yard ; " an enclosure about a house, church, barn, 
&c." from Anglo-Saxon Gyrd-an, cingere, to gird, 
to surround, to enclose. Hence also, a yard, a gar- 
den ; any enclosed space. 

Growth; that, &c. groweth; Anglo-Saxon 
Grow-an. 

Harm; Anglo-Saxon jvmth or jerm^/i; that, 
&c. harmef/z or hwrieth ; Anglo-Saxon Frw-an or 
Jerm-an, lasdere. Harm is one of those third per- 
sons from which, as a noun, the final th has been 
dropped. See ante. Breadth. 

Health ; that which heale^A or maketh one to 
be hale or whole ; (see ante. Hell, &c.) Anglo- 
Saxon hel-a.Ti, teg-ere. 

Knave, (Anglo-Saxon Cnafa,) was probably 
l^af-ath, that is, ne-hadf-ath, ge-naf-ath ; third per- 
son singular of IN^abban, that is, ne-hab-an. So ge- 
n«/*, gencefd. nsef-ig, noefga, are, in Anglo-Saxon, 
mendicus, egens. So Latin Ne-quam is held by 
Latin etymologists to mean, ne-quicquam; one 
who has nothing, neither goods nor good qualities. 
And to this purpose, Chaucer, C T. 6772 : — 

" But he that nought hath, or coveiteth to have. 

Is riche, although ye hold him but a knave.''^ 

Math; Anglo-Saxon May-e^A; that which, or 
which any one, mow-e^/z ; as the latter math ; that 
is, later or after the former mow-mg ; Anglo-Saxon 
Maw-2iii, met-ere, to mow. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 175 

Might ; Anglo-Saxon Isllddg-eth or 'M.ddgthe, that 
is, what one m^y-eth ; Anglo-Saxon m«^-an, posse, 
valere. Meath ; a word in very common use in 
Lincolnshire : " I give thee the meath of the buy- 
ing ; option, or full power of price and purchase." 
' — Skinner. See ante. Breadth. 

Mirth, Murther. Mirth, that which dissi- 
pateth ; namely, care, sorrow, melancholy, &c. 
Anglo-Saxon iWyrr-an. (See ante. Morrow.) 

The Anglo-Saxon M.ovth, M.oYthe, is the Latin 
Mors, that is, quod dissipat (subaud. vitam), third 
person of the same verb ?72?/rr-an, to mar, &c. and 
having the same meaning as mirth, but a diiferent 
application and subaudition. Hence, from IsJlovthe, 
murth-er, the French Meurtre and Latin Mors. 

Month; Anglo-Saxon mon-«^A. Moon was 
formerly written mone, and mon^A Tdoneth; the 
period in which that planet laioiiieth or completeth 
her orbit. 

Moth; Gothic Matjan, Anglo-Saxon met-ism', 
to eat. Moth, an insect that eateth (also Meat, 
whatever is eaten). See Tooth, infra. 

Mouth ; MatJ2Y/i ; that which eateth. 

Ruth ; that which any one rueth, moaneth, re- 
penteth. Anglo-Saxon hreoiv-s^^n., lugere, psenitere. 

Sheath ; that which sheatheth, shadeth, cover- 
eth. Anglo-Saxon scead-Sin, segregare. Hence 
also. Shade, Shed. 

Light ; that which light-eth ; Anglo-Saxon 
Leoht-^^A, leoh^A, and leoht. Anglo- Saxon Leoht- 
an, illuminare (^th dropped, as in Harm). 

Sloth ; See ante. Slack, Slow. 



176 OF ABSTRACTION. 

Smith ; one who smitethy sc. with a hammer, &-c. 
" That in his for ffe smithed plow harneis." — Dan 
Gerveis. But the name was given to all who smote 
with the hammer, &c. for example. Carpenter, and 
much used in composition. 

Sight ; Anglo-Saxon sith and sithe, that is, 
that faculty which seeth ; Anglo-Saxon se-on, to 
see ; also applied to that which we see. See ante. 
Breadth. 

Stealth ; applied to the manner by which one 
steal-Qih, or doeth any thing silently or secretly. 

Strength; that which stringeth or maketh 
one strong ; Anglo-Saxon strang-i2in., valere, prae- 
valere. 

Tilth; that which, any manner of operation 
which tilleth, that is,lifteth, or turneth up, or raiseth 
the earth. In Gower, the crafte of plough tillynge, 
is the craft of lifting up the earth with a plough. 
Anglo-Saxon til-\^n, toll-eie. See ante, p. 166, 
Tall, and p. 121, Tilt. 

Tooth (Gothic taujith); that which tuggeth ; 
Gothic taujan, Anglo- Saxon teog-sm, to tug; 
Swedish tugga, mandere. 

Truth. See infra. 

Warmth ; that which ivarmeth. 

Wath, Wadeth, Wad'th, Wath ; that where 
any one wadeth; in Lincolnshire applied to a 
ford. 

Wealth ; Anglo-Saxon weleg-mn, locupletare, 
to enrich; — that which enricheth. [It is in our early 
writers, generally, that which weal-eih ; which acts, 
effects, the weal or welfare. " Let Kings, if they 



OF ABSTKACTION. 177 

had leuer be Christians indeed, than so to be called, 
giue themselves altogether to the wealth of their 
realms after the ensample of Jesus Christ." — Tyis^- 
DALE. Ohedience of a Christian Man. Works, 
V. i. p. 212. (By Eussei.) 

" Let no man seek his own, but every man an- 
other's wealth:'— I Cor. x. 24.] 

Truth. Though the first word that Ave are 
introduced to in this chapter, is that apple of dis- 
cord — truth, I have, on account of its importance, 
reserved it for the last. We are taught, in the first 
place, that — 

True (or, as formerly written, trew) means that 
which is trowQdi ; and is the past participle of the 
Gothic verb ^7'«w-an, Anglo-Saxon treow-d^Ji, con- 
fidere, to think, to believe firmly, to be thoroughly 
persuaded of, to trow ; and, in the next place, that 
of this verb, to trow, — 

Truth (formerly written Troweth, TrOWTh, 
Trouth, Troth) is the third person indicative ; 
and that it means (aliquid, any thing, some thing) 
that which one troweth, thinketh or firmly be- 
lieveth. And except only in words (that is, when 
one thing is thought, and another told), there is 
nothing but truth in the world. 

" But truth supposes mankind, for whom, and 
by whom alone the world was formed, and to whom 
only it is applicable. If NO man,^ no truth. 
There is, therefore, no such thing as eternal, im- 
mutable and everlasting truth; unless mankind, 
such as they are at present, be also eternal, immu- 
table and everlasting." And again, " There can be 

N 



178 OF ABSTRACTIONS^ 

nothing trowec? unless there be some one trow- 

Now these, to my understanding, appear to be 
mere truisms. 

Truth pertains to mortal and mutable beings ; 
it can and wiD. endure, as long as they endure, but 
no longer : and the eternity and immutability of 
that which pertains to a mortal and mutable being, 
and to that being alone, as such, is denied. 

And tliis denial need give no alarm to those who 
uphold that there is a truth (which may be distin- 
guished, Kar e^oyrrjV) as the truth), or a thought, a 
behef, a right- wise, or right-eous truth, Avhich it 
concerns the happiness of all to comprehend within 
theu' minds ; which may be, and should be deduced 
from the rio;ht readino;, the rio;ht understandinoc of 
the will of God; and this (as Paley justly ob- 
serves) " is the whole business of morality." 

It appears to me that the Archbishop of DubKn 
entertains an erroneous conception of our Author's 
meaning. He charges him with a fallacy " founded 
on etymology ;" namely, " when a word is used at 
one time in its customary, and at another in its 
etymological sense." And he proceeds to the 
employment of a palpable fallacy himself, in charg- 
ing Home Tooke with contending " that it is idle 
to speak of eternal or immutable truth, because the 



* If the reader has any desire to learn into what verbal intri- 
cacies the contrary doctrine has led our philosophers, let him 
read that most erudite " Treatise concerning Eternal and Im- 
mutable Morality," by Dr. Cudworth. And it is against such 
crazy theories as this that Tooke's hostility is directed. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 179 

word is derived from to Hrow/ that is, ^believe.' " 
I have quoted the words of Tooke : " If no man, 
no truth," there is therefore, that is, because man, 
that is, mankind, and truth, from beginning to end, 
co-exist together, are born and die together; so 
long as the thinker lives, so long will thinkz/z^ live; 
and as the thinker is mortal and mutable, thinkz/z^ 
cannot be eternal and immutable. 

A fallacy, when treating of fallacies, is the error 
of the learned and able Logician ; he ascribes to 
his opponent an insufficient premiss, which his op- 
ponent does not employ ; and withdraws a premiss 
which his opponent does employ, and does so em- 
ploy, because he thinks it, trows, or believes it, 
sufficient to establish the consequence deduced. 

It is simply because nothing eternal and immu- 
table can be attributed to man, as he is at present, 
that the word truth is employed to express that 
which must perish with him — thought. 

Dr. Whately asserts that by this imputed fallacy, 
^^ Home Tooke has furnished a whole magazine of 
weapons for any sophist who may need them:"* 
but if he has done so, it is quite as true, that he 
has furnished a destructive armoury from which 
the sophist may be reduced to silence. But Dr. 
Whately is, unawares, arguing from the abuse of 
etymology against its use. His antipathy to its 
use even he does not conceal. " It is worth ob- 
serving," he writes, " as a striking instance of the 
little reliance to be placed on etymology as a guide 



* Logic, b. iii. § 8. 



180 OF ABSTRACTION. 

to the meaning of a word," (by tKe meaniTig^ 
presume is intended, what Dr. Wliatelj calls ^ the 
customary sense,') " that Hypo-stasis, sub-stantia, 
and under-standing, so widely different in their" 
(customary) " sense, correspond in their etymo- 
logy."* And it is thus that he writes, after having 
resorted to the etymology of hypo-stasis to account 
for the adoption of that word by the Greek theo- 
logians, and after having produced the etymolo- 
gical, that is, the intrinsic meaning (on which the 
propriety of every customary sense must depend), 
as affording a sufficient reason for their otherwise 
unaccountable adopted apphcation of it. " It" 
(the word hypostasis, Dr. Whately informs us) 
" seems calculated to express ^ that which stands 
under (that is) the subject of attributes.' " 

Undoubtedly it does, and as undoubtedly jus- 
tifies the appropriation of it to the distressing ne- 
cessities of those learned men; and I am much 
mistaken if this same etymological meaning will 
not account as satisfactorily for the " different" 
(customary) " senses," that is, the different appli- 
cations of the one meaning, in which we use the 
other two — substance and understanding. 

Substance, we apply to " that which stands 
under" (that is, the subject of qualities; the 
qualities of matter). 

Undee STANDING, we apply to " that which 
stands under;" that is, the subject of thoughts, 
ideas ; that on which they are impressed. 

Dr. Whately here appears to have furnished, 

* Logic, Appendix, i. § 17. 



OF ABSTRACTION-. 181 

from his own magazine, a weapon tliat is strong 
enough to repel his attack on the use of Etymo- 
logy.* 

I have endeavoured to convey a just conception 
of Tooke's doctrine on the meaning and usages de- 
duced from the meaning of the word truth, by the 
following method of explanation : 

Troth or Truth, Trow, True. 

To Trow; to think, to have thoughts, ideas; 
(emphatically) to believe firmly, to be thoroughly 
persuaded of; to be convinced of. 

True ; anciently written trew (the regular past 
tense and participle of trow, as grew of grow, knew 
of know^, means, trowed, thought, believed firmly ; 
agreeable to, conformable to or consistent with 
truth ; with our thoughts or behef ; — faithful, vera- 
cious, real. 

Truth means any thing which any one troweth; 
thinketh, firmly believeth, is thoroughly persuaded 
or convinced of; — belief, faith, fidehty, verity, ve- 
racity, reality. And further, with more latitude, it 
is applied to — fidelity to laws, rules, promises, en- 
gagements ; — to honour, honesty, integrity, loyalty, 
chastity, &c. 

Troth ; that which any one troweth, plighteth 
to be true or trusty, or faithful ; Truth, veracity, 
faith, fidelity, fealty. 

Piers Ploughman uses the (to us) extraordinary 

* Dr. Whately is editor of a little book entitled " A Selection 
of English Synonymes," in which it maybe presumed all" reliance 
on Etymology" is discarded. Mr. Trench, " On the Study of 
Words," adopts a different course : and great are the advantages 
resulting from so doing. . 




182 or ABSTEACTIOK 

expression, " many a false truth." " Arrews fea- 
thered with fair byheste" (that is, promise), " and 
many a false truth (that is, deceitful thought or 
meaning)." 

" True and False are attributes of speech, not 
of things ; and where speech is not, there is neither 
truth nor falsehood.^'' — Hobhes. 

" Teuth consists in the right ordering of names 
in our afl&rmations." — Id. 

" Truth is the conformity of words or signs, 
by which things are expressed, to the things them- 
selves." — Wollaston. 

" Truth and Falsehood belong in propriety 
of speech only to propositions." — Locke, 

" Our ideas, being nothing but bare appearances 
or perceptions in our minds, cannot properly and 
simply in themselves be said to be true or false, no 
more than a single name of any thing can be said 
to be true or false." — Id. 

I have made this long extract from my Diction- 
ary,* as well for the purpose of showing how our 
present usages of true and truth may be traced back 
to the intrinsic meaning of the words, as of show- 
ing how vague were the conceptions of philoso- 
phers as to that meaning. Their definitions of 
truth apply not to truth itself, or what any man 
troweth, but to the communication of it by speech 
to others. And Locke's position, that our ideas 
cannot be true or false, is as much as to say, that 
what a man troweth or thinketh, cannot be his truth 
or thought. The quotation from Piers Plough- 

* The 8vo. edition. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 183 

man is very explicit, that a man may think or trow 
one thing, and say another.* And from an old 
English Poetical Version of the Athanasian Creed, 
quoted in Hickes's Thesaurus (Gram. Anglo- Sax. 
et Mgeso-Goth. p. 223), we find that there is a right 
truth, as contradistinguished from a wrong. 

Who so wil be sauf to blis 

Before all thinges nede to is 

That he hald with all his miht 

The heli trauthe and leue (believe) it riht. 
And again : 

That he trowe it trewli — 

Then is ever trault (trauthe or truth) right. — 
P. 234. 

I would add to the foregoing explanations that a 
customary usage of the word True is — that which 
is and has been trowed by many, by very many, by 
the great majority, in successive ages ; and which 
is therefore accepted as proved and indisputable ; — 
and that as a customary usage of the word, Truth 
is that which many, very many, the great majority, 
do trow, and have trowed in successive ages, and 
which we in like manner accept as proved and in- 
disputable. 

But (it is asked) are the corresponding and the 
equivalent words in other languages resolvable in 
the same manner as True ? Does the Latin verus 
also mean trowed? 

* " Who dares think one thing, and another tell, 
My heart detests him, as the gates of hell." 

Achilles' Speech to Ulysses : — who was not famous for 
telling the truth. II. b. 9. 



184 or ABSTRACTION. 

It means nothing else. Res, a thing, gives*^ 
reor, that is, I am thing -ed ; Ve-reor, I am strong- 
ly thing-ed ; for ve, in Latin composition, means 
valde, that is, valide ; and verum, that is, strongly 
impressed upon the mind, is the contracted parti- 
ciple of ve-reor. And hence the distinction between 
vereri and metuere in Latin : " Veretur liber, metuit 
servus."* Hence also revereor. 

" I am thingedP'' exclaims Tooke's friend; "who- 
ever used such language before ?" and Mr. Stewart 
participates in his distaste. Quinctilian calls the 
Latin reor, horrid-um (verb-um). But it is not a 
matter of taste that is under consideration. In 
Anglo-Saxon thine, thinc^, thing, is their various 
ways of writing our English noun, thing. And 
thinc-Siu, thi7ic-esiia., is to think: Me thincth, The 
thincth, mihi videtur, tibi videtur; — Me thuhte. 
The thuhte, mihi, tibi visum est, are our old and 
not uncommon expressions. Me thinketh or thing- 
eth (c into g) ; it thingeth me, or causeth me to 
think. Me-thuhte; it thought, or caused me to 
think.f 

jPr. Where shall we sojoume till our coronation ? 

Glo. Where it thinks best unto your royal self. 
Richard III. p. 186. Act iii. sc. 1. 

Thin^ was written thin^ by Bishop Hoper, and 
nothing is a common cockney ism. 

Where it thinks ; where it seems, or it is seen 
best. Ubicunque videtur. 

* Metuebant servi ; verebantur liberi (Appium Claudium Cae- 
cum). Cic. de Senect. § 37. 

f See in Lye the same form of expression in v. ThyrstaUj it 
thirsteth me, that is, causes me to thirst. 



OF AB8TEACTI0N. 185 

[I have felt no hesitation in defining *^ Thing, 
that which (any thing) we think, or causes us to 
think; that which causes thought, sensation, or 
feeling."* 

" Such ways of speaking," says Locke, (sc. that 
fire is light and hot,) " truly signify nothing, but 
those powers which are in things to excite certain 
sensations or ideas in us." — B. ii. c. 31. 

As thiyig is that which causes us to think, is the 
cause of sensations or ideas, so to think is the effect ; 
that is, to receive, to have, sensations or ideas. 

The learned languages (it has frequently been 
remarked) are the usual resort for words, and the 
formation of words, when our own language seems 
insufficient for the purpose ; or where the coinage 
would appear too base to be allowed to pass cur- 
rent. The Latin realis would probably have struck 
Quinctilian as an adjective still more horrid than 
the horrid verb reor : when the word wasjlrst in- 
vented has not been ascertained. The Nominales 
Philosophi had classic authority for the existence 
of their appellation, though not for the use to 
which they applied it; and their antagonists, the 
Reales Philosophi, stole their model from the camp 
of the enemy. If in our language our own trans- 
lators had appended a Latin termination to an 
English noun, and rendered this Latin realis, by an 
English adjective thingal, and had attempted to 
talk of the thingality of things, with as much com- 
placency as we have done, and continue to do, of 

* There is no other means of explaining thing than by a sub- 
audition of iudf—no other more general term which will com« 
prehend it. 



186 OF ABSTRACTION-. 

their reality ; the common sense of our Philoso- 
phers would have been as offensively affected as the 
taste of Mr. Stewart appears to have been by the 
before unheard of expression, " I am thinged ; " — 
with this advantage, that the word, and with the 
word much of the mysterious dogmatism to which 
its unhappily adopted Latin prototype has been 
devoted, would have been refused admittance into 
our Schools of Philosophy. This verb, to thing, 
however, is not introduced with a view to its adop- 
tion, but for the single purpose of assisting in the 
exposition of the philosophy of speech. 

The verbs, to hethink, and to mind, afford ex- 
amples of the same tendency. Chaucer, Canter-- 
bury Tales, v. 4401, writes — 

^' At last his Maister hym bethought :" 
that is, caused himself to think. And this usage 
is common. Bethink jour ?>Q\i\ 1 bethought mj self ; 
that is, cause yourself to think ; I caused myself to 
think. And Surrey — " ^neas full minded to de- 
part ; " that is, having it fully minted on his mind. 

And the Scotch say, " I never mind sermons ; " 
not as Ave should mean — I never heed sermons; 
but I never mint, or cause myself to mint or im- 
press them on my mind; or sermons never mint or 
impress themselves on my mind. 

To conclude what I trow on these words True 
and Truth. 

If a man tells me what he thinks, he tells me 
the truth ; if I believe him, his truth becomes my 
truth. If he proclaims it at market crosses, and 
the surrounding multitude believes him, his truth 



J 



OF ABSTEACTIOIS^. 187 

becomes the truth of the surrounding multitude. 
If he tells it to the world, and the world believes 
him, his truth becomes the world's truth. And 
thus we reach to a general or universal truth, or a 
thought, a belief generally or universally received ; 
and it is thus, probably, that, forgetting our nature, 
we arrive at the conclusion that what is so generally, 
so universally believed, must be immutahle truth. 
And, further, as there are truths that have been 
accepted from generation to generation, through 
successive ages, from time immemorial, we con- 
clude also that there must be everlasting, eternal 
truth. 

A remarkable instance has lately occurred (and 
in our Courts of Justice remarkable instances are 
constantly recurring) of the truth of honest men 
being opposed to the truth of others equally ho- 
nest, and in which the truth of a jury was to 
decide by their true verdict, to which of the truth- 
ful parties credit was to be given, for thinhing (or 
being thinged), for trowing rightly and speaking 
accordingly. 

The cause was tried at Edinburgh; and the 
point at issue was — Whether a certain mineral 
found on certain lands was or was not COAL ? 

On one side there appeared as witnesses, gen- 
tlemen whose scientific knowledge Avas undoubted, 
and whose integrity of character was equally so^ 
who deposed their truth, their firm persuasion, 
that this mineral was not coal ; and that such was 
their belief, because they could not, by the help of 
most powerful microscopes, discern the slightest 



188 OF ABSTRACTION^. 

traces of vegetable tissue in the sections, frag- 
ments, or any sensible parts of tbe mineral. 

On the other side appeared as witnesses, gentle- 
men, equally credible on all accounts, who de- 
posed their truth, their firm persuasion and belief, 
that this mineral was coal, and that such was their 
belief, because they could and did, by the help of 
similar microscopes, discern the plainest traces of 
vegetable tissue in the same portions of this same 
mineral. 

And the jury believed those whose evidence was 
positive ; not those whose evidence was negative. 

It is my belief that the witnesses on both sides 
saw the same things ; and that these things were 
recognized by the one party, but were not so re- 
cognized by the other, as forming that tissue or 
texture of parts, the existence of which in this mine- 
ral was to be decided by their testimony, and on 
which decision the verdict of " Coal or no Coal," 
entirely depended. All, witnesses and jurymen, 
spoke the truth, 

Boswell tells us, that Johnson distinguished 
between physical and moral truth (as many had 
done before him) thus : " Physical truth is, when 
you tell a thing exactly as it is ; moral truth is, 
when you tell a thing sincerely and precisely as it 
appears to you. I say, such a one walked across 
the street : if he really did so, I told a physical 
truth. If I thought so, though I should have 
been mistaken, I told a moral truth." * 

Common sense, and our common law, recognize 

* Boswell, V. iv. p. 338, 8vo. ed. 



OF ABSTEACTION. 189 

the distinction intended by Johnson (and which 
would be now expressed by the terms objective 
and subjective). To constitute the crime of per- 
jury, the false truth (to use the words of Piers 
Ploughman), the false swearing " must be corrupt 
(that is, committed malo animo), wilful, positive, 
and absolute, not upon surprise, or the ZzAe."* 

And what are the conditions of the instances 
stated by Johnson ? Simply these — 

That in what he calls a Physical Truth — 
The Truth is as the fact is — they coincide. 

In what he calls a Moral Truth — 

The Truth is not as the fact is ; they do not 
coincide. 

The application of the word differs, but the mean- 
ing is the same : coincidence, or no coincidence, 
forms no part of it. We cannot divest it of its 
meaning. We may, as the poet says of Nature, 
toss it out with a pitch-fork, but incontinently it 
will return. 

And now, I hope I may indulge myself in the 
satisfaction of believing that I have so represented, 
so illustrated the doctrine of the " Diversions of 
Purley " on this grand word, truth, as at least, to 
place the composers of systems, and their disciples, 
on their guard in their manner of employing it. 
And I further hope another result may be antici- 
pated ; that by an extension of mutual charity, in 
the intercourse of the world we may be induced to 
allow that men may tell their truth, on occasions 
when it is quite at variance with our own. 

* Blackstone, iv. 137. 



190 OF ABSTRACTION. 

I have, I trust, already disposed of tlie " Philo- 
logical Nostrum of past participles" imputed to 
our Author by Professor Stewart ; and I now, as 
I also trust, have performed the same service to 
Dr. Whately's " Fallacy Founded on Etymology." 
And it does not appear to me that I could find a 
better opportunity than the present, while the pre- 
ceding etymologies are fresh in the memory of the 
reader, for noticing another, and that most impor- 
tant error, and consequent misconception, in which 
these two distinguished writers equally participate. 

" Mr. Tooke," says the Professor, " assumes as 
a principle, that in order to ascertain with precision 
the philosophical import of any word, it is neces- 
sary to trace its progress historically through all 
the successive meanings, which it has been em- 
ployed to convey from the moment that it was first 
introduced into our language ; and if the word be 
of foreign growth, that we should prosecute the 
research till we ascertain the literal and primitive 
sense of the root from whence it sprang. It is 
in this literal and primitive sense alone, that ac- 
cording to him, a philosopher is entitled to employ 
it even in the present advanced state of science, 
and whenever he annexes to it a meaning at all 
difierent, he imposes equally upon himself and 
others."* 

To the Professor I reply, that Tooke's doctrine 
IS simply this : That from the etymology of the 
word we should fix the intrinsic meaning; that 
that meaning should always furnish the cause of 

* Philosophical Essays, pp. 165 and 190, 4to. ed. 



OF ABSTRACTION. 191 

the application, and that no application of any word 
is justifiable for whicli that meaning will not supply 
a reason ; but that the usage of any application so 
supported is not only allowable but indispensable. 

Indeed, in endeavouring to establish the origin 
of a very numerous class of words, he assumed, 
and was forced to assume, a diversity of application, 
and it was solely for a meaning to justify this di- 
versity that he pursued these terms to their source. 
And those are not the least curious parts of his 
book, in Avhich he shows the same words to be 
differently written — a difference introduced and 
confirmed merely for the sake of preserving a dis- 
tinct difference of application in usage. I say 
usage, from a conviction that these different modes 
of writing might hy usage have interchanged their 
different applications, and it would be a matter of 
no great difl&culty to produce instances in which 
an interchange has actually occurred. The mean- 
ing, nevertheless, remains uniform, unvarying, and 
invariable ; the application and subaudition as un- 
limited as the numberless necessities of speech. 

Dr. Whately represents that Tooke's principle 
is this : " That the meaning and force of a word, 
now and for ever, must be that which it or its root 
originally bore." And this, he asserts, is absolutely 
false. 

If Dr. AVhately intends that Tooke insists " the 
radical intrinsic meaning to be now and for ever 
the same," he is right in so doing ; and Tooke is 
right also. 

If Dr. Whately intends that Tooke insists ^^ the 



192 OF ABSTEACTIOIsr. 

application of the word, that is, our meaning in 
applying it, must be in the radical, intrinsic mean- 
ing, the literal, primitive sense, and in no other," 
he is wrong in so doing; Tooke insists upon no 
such absurdity. 

Dr. TVTiately supplies an instance, which pre- 
sents an easy explanation of what it is that Tooke 
actually does insist upon ; and I hope by its aid to 
remove the misapprehension under which he la- 
bours, as I hope to have removed that, under which 
the eminent Professor had unfortunately laboured 
before him. The two, indeed, are substantially 
the same. 

" He might as well," exclaims the Doctor, " have 
insisted that sycophant can never mean any thing 
but Jig-shower.''^ There is no doubt that Tooke 
would so have insisted; and there is as httle 
doubt that he would have insisted upon no more 
than an obvious fact : and one I hope, very briefly, 
so to represent as to ensure the conviction of the 
Right Reverend Archbishop himself. 

It matters little to the purpose, whether the 
original application of the compound word, syco^ 
phant, adopted by Dr. T\niately, or the common 
one* be correct. 

A syco-phant, or Jig-shower , might be originally 
applied to him, philosopher or not, who showed 
his fig — in token of a challenge to a contest ; and 
thence might its application to any challenger be 
deduced, whether showing his token or not, to any 
one provoking strife, or litigation, or quarrel ; and 

• See Plut. De Curiositate, c. 16. 



OF ABSTKACTIOIT. 193 

hence applied to what the English law denominates 
a common Barrator : then, 1. to an informer ; 2. to 
an informer of any thing pleasing, gratifying, flat- 
tering to the hearer ; to a flatterer, to a parasite. 
Or it might be originally applied to him who 
showed, gave evidence, — informed that figs were 
(contrary to law) carried out of Attica ; and thence 
the same applications be deduced as above set 
forth. 

The word syco-phant still retains its meaning ; 
challenger, informer, parasite, flatterer, never enter 
into it, never become whole or part of it; that 
word still means, that is, means etymologically, 
and ever must so mean, a fig-shower, and nothing 
else; but in any application founded upon this 
meaning, and inferred from it, (as in the above ex- 
planation, every application is inferred,) the word 
may be used to denote the meaning of the speaker, 
and is so used with propriety. The meaning or 
intention of the speaker in using the word, may be 
very diflerent from the meaning of the word itself; 
but there must be some inference or deduction in 
the mind of the speaker, known to the hearer, 
which will warrant the usage. And such is the 
clear and decided doctrine of Home Tooke. The 
misconceptions of Professor Stewart, and Dr. 
Whately, originate in this: that they have not 
distinguished the application or customary usages 
from the intrinsic meaning so strongly and repeat- 
edly insisted upon in the " Diversions of Purley." 

As rationally indeed might it be asserted, that 
the thing — a fig shown, when intended to signify a 
o 



194 OF ABSTRACTION. 

challenge to disputation, changed its nature, and 
was no longer a fig shown, as that the word, syco^ 
•pliant^ when intended to signify a challenger, no 
longer meant a fig-shower. The thing was a vi- 
sible sign of a purpose intended, by one party, and 
so understood by another — and the word, an au- 
dible sign of equivalent, intent, and import. 

Lord Brougham charges our Author with main- 
taining that which, without abandoning his own 
principles, he could not maintain ; namely, that he 
would hold the law of Libel to be absurd and un- 
just, because the word libel means a little book. 
We have I think Tooke's own testimony, that he 
would hold no such thing ; nor can it be maintained 
that he ought, as a consequence from his own 
principles, to hold such a doctrine. As he well 
understood so he would strictly observe, the dis- 
tinction between the legal application and the in- 
trinsic meaning of the word. He made no com- 
plaint, when the opportunity was before him, and 
invited him so to do, against the law of libel ; his 
complaint was, that in the information against him 
the law was not complied with ; that the crime, 
for which he was prosecuted, was not described in 
that plain language, which, by the law relating to 
libel, he had a right to expect.* 

I will put together a few general remarks, scat- 
tered through the pages of his work, which ought 
to remove all misapprehensions of our Author's 
principles. 

* Diversions of Purley, v. 1. Advertisement, Note. 



OF ABSTRACTION". 195 

Of great importance it surely is, "that we 
should have a clear understanding of the words we 
use in discourse. For as far as we know not our 
own meaning ; as far as our purposes are not en- 
dowed with Avords to make them known — so far 
' we gabble like things most brutish.' But the im- 
portance rises higher, when we reflect upon the 
application of words to metaphysics ; and all gene- 
ral reasoning, all politics, law, morality, and divi- 
nity are merely metaphysic." 

It is however " a trifling etymology, that barely 
refers us to some word in another language, either 
the same or similar ; — nor is it sufficient to produce 
instances of the use of a doubtful word, from 
which to conjecture its meaning ; though instances 
are fit to be produced in order, by the use of the 
word, to justify the oflered etymology. Interpre- 
ters, who thus seek the meaning of a word singly 
from the passages in which it is found, usually 
connect with it the meaning of some other word 
or words in the sentence. A regard to the indi- 
vidual etymology of the word would secure them 
from this error, and conduct them to the intrinsic 
meaning of the word, and the cause of its applica- 
tion. — All etymological pursuit beyond this, is 
merely for the gratification of a childish curiosity, 
in which the understanding takes no share, and 
from which it can derive no advantage. That 
" word is always sufficiently original in that lan- 
guage where its meaning, which is the cause of 
its application, can be found. — Nor should it oc- 
casion surprise or discouragement, that words so 



196 OF ABSTKACTIOIS'. 

different in their present application, should be 
traced to the same origm ; for it is the necessary 
condition of all languages ; it is the lot of man, as 
of all other animals, to have few different ideas 
(and there is a good physical reason for it), though 
we have many words ; and yet even of them we 
have by no means so many, of different significa- 
tions, as we are supposed to have," 



CHAP. YI. 

[ The three remaining chapters are devoted to 
adjectives and participle s,'\ 

OY ADJECTIVES. 

THEY and the Participles, it must be remem- 
bered, were originally assumed as the pecu- 
liar province of this work. Prepositions, conjunc- 
tions and adverbs have been resolved, in the first 
volume, into one or the other of the two necessary 
parts of speech ; into nouns or verbs. Adjectives 
and participles are useful for despatch ; and, having 
a different manner of signification, are properly in- 
cluded in the arrangement of the parts of speech 
in our grammars. 

But what, it is asked, are these adjectives and 
participles by which the doctrine of abstraction 
has in the preceding chapters been set aside ? 

What is an adjective ? Lowth tells us, that it 



OF ADJECTIVES. 197 

is not a noun ; it is not tlie name of a thing ; and 
Harris, that it should not have been ranged with 
nouns, as it never denotes substances ; but with 
verbs, as both denote attributes : that is, accidents 
and qualities. Some of their ablest predecessors* 
differ from Lowth and Harris ; and our own coun- 
trymen, Wilkins and Wallis, among the number. 
Wallis asserts, that the Adjectivurn respectivum is 
nothing else than the very substantive word itself, 
adjective posita ; that is to say, it is a substantive 
put in apposition with another substantive. Gold 
and brass are names of things, and denote sub- 
stances. If Ave say a gold-ring, a brass-tube, here 
are substantives, adjective posita, yet names of 
things, and denoting substances. 

If we say a golden ring, a brazen tube, the ter- 
mination couples the two words instead of the 
hyphen ; and the adjectives golden, brazen, denote 
the same things as gold, brass. Nothing is taken 
away from, nothing is added to, their signification, 
but what is contained in the termination en. The 
three adjective terminations en, ed, and ig (our 
modern y), mean give, add, join, and thus designate 
this added circumstance, that the substantives, to 
which they are added as terminations, are to be 
joined to some other substantive : and this single 
added circumstance (called by Wilkins that oi per- 
taining to) is the only difference between a sub- 
stantive and an adjective ; between gold and golden. 

Wallis proposes to call our possessive case, 

* Scaliger, Sanctius, Scioppius, Yossius. 



198 OF ADJECTIVES. 

formed by tlie termination '5 or es — Adjectwmn 
possessivum; and the common grammatical rule 
tliat an adjective cannot stand alone in a sentence, 
might induce Wallis so to call it, for man^s cannot 
stand alone any more than human. In both cases 
we expect another name of a thing. No oblique 
cases stand alone ; so that this circumstance of not 
standing alone, is not confined to the adjective. 

Grammarians have maintained that adjectives 
represent only accidental qualities ; that substan- 
tive and accident were the foundation of the differ- 
ence between the substantive and adjective ; yet 
human goodness, and marHs goodness, have pre- 
cisely the same meaning ; and if the adjective hu- 
man represent an accidental quality, so must the 
oblique case mavL§. 

In the expression a good man ; good represents 
all the ideas signified by the term goodness ; all the 
difference between the substantive and adjective 
is, that by the latter part of speech we are by 
" some small difference in termination, enabled, 
when we employ the sign of an idea, to communi- 
cate at the same time that such sign is then meant 
to be added to another sign, in such a manner as 
that the two signs together may answer the pur- 
pose of one complex term. This contrivance is 
merely an abbreviation in the sorts of words to 
supply the want of an abbreviation in terms," 
which latter abbreviation we can sometimes effect ; 
as though we have no complex term for good 
man, we have for holy man. 

The hyphen supplies a deficiency in our lan« 



OF ADJECTIVES. 199 

guage : it is not a word or letter because it is not 
the sign of a sound ; but it is, what every word 
should be, the sign of an idea ; with this difference, 
that it is conveyed to the eye only, and not to the 
ear. In our language we are sometimes obliged to 
have recourse to it; thus, sea-weed, shell-fish, 
hail-storm, &c. are necessary compounds; as we 
have not any complex term to express these collec- 
tions of ideas, nor any termination to indicate our 
intention of adjecting. Such words as sea, shell, 
hail, our old grammarian. Gill, calls by the name of 
substantiva sterilia, because they produce no ad- 
jective.* 

The adjective is therefore well called Noun-ad- 
jective ; for it is the name of a thing, which may 
coalesce with another name of a thing. 

Were it true that adjectives were not the names 
of things, there could be no attribution by adjec- 
tives, for you cannot attribute nothing. They must, 
as substantives do, denote substances, and substance 
is attributed to substance by the adjective contri- 
vance of language. Substances, essences, accidents, 
are equally indifferently denoted, sometimes by 
grammatical substantives, and sometimes by gram- 
matical adjectives. 

[It is this doctrine that our Author has so ela- 
borately and effectually exerted himself to estab- 
lish : and the value of his exertions will be the more 



* For the various offices of the hyphen, see my English Dic- 
tionary. Also Mr. Guest's paper in the " Proceedings of the 
PhUological Society," No. 113. 



200 OF ADJECTIVES. 

higlily estimated by tliose wlio are acquainted with 
the monstrous consequences that were introduced 
by metaphysical theologians ; one most eminently 
conspicuous, was no less than this, that in the 
sacrament of the Lord's Supper there was a con- 
version of the substance of the bread and wine 
into the substance of the body and blood of Christ ; 
of the bread into the body, and of the wine into 
the blood; but that the accidents or qualities re- 
mained unchanged. The Komish Church was 
driven to this subtlety, in order to evade, what it 
could not resist, the evidence of the senses. 

^^ These ever plainly witness that even after the 
supposed change of the bread and wine in the 
Supper into the body and blood of Christ, yet 
nothing but the appearance, smell, taste, and other 
qualities of bread and wine are received. In op- 
position to this a distinction is made between sub- 
stance and qualities (^ or accidents'), it being main- 
tained that the former has undergone a change, 
while the latter remain as before ; however much 
this ran contrary to simple comprehension, which 
plainly teaches us that substance and qualities 
cannot be separated, since the former is known by 
the latter, and the latter are determined by the 
former."*] 

To return to our adjectives. We have adjec- 
tives ending in ly, ous, ful, some, les, ish, &c. ; all 
of which are compound words; the termination 
being originally a word added to those other 

* D'Aubigne, History of the Reformationj v. i. p. 147, note. 



OF ADJECTIVES. 201 

words, of which it now seems merely the termina- 
tion, though it still retains its original and distinct 
signification. These terminations are now more 
numerous in our language than they were formerly; 
for our ancestors borrowed and incorporated many 
adjective terminations which we did not want ; so 
that in some words we have a choice; such as 
bountiful, bounteous, beautiful, beauteous. And 
we have not only borrowed terminations, but in- 
stead of adjectiving our own substantives, we have 
borrowed, in immense numbers, adjectived signs 
from other languages, without always borrowing the 
unadjectived signs of those same ideas ; and neg- 
lected to improve our own language by the same 
contrivance within itself- — Mind is our own word. 
Mental, magnanimous, &c. are from the Latin, and 
a list of about two hundred substantives, with their 
foreign adjectives, is given in the work. 

Adjectives, though convenient abbreviations, are 
not* necessary to language ; and are, therefore, not 
ranked amongst the parts of speech. In the misap- 
prehension of this useful and simple contrivance of 
language may be discovered one of the foundations 
of those heaps of false philosophy and obscure (be- 
cause mistaken) metaphysics, with which we have 
been bewildered. We may learn what to do with 
all the technical impertinence about qualities, ac- 
cidents, substrata, essence, the adjunct nature of 
things, &c. &c. And to proceed with our Author 



* An account is given of a tribe of North American Indians, 
who had no adjectives in their language. 



202 OF ADJECTIYES. 

to '' a very different sort of logic and critic than 
what we have been hitherto acquainted with;" 
of which a knowledge of the nature of language 
and of the meaning of words is a necessary fore- 
runner. 



CHAP. YII. 

OF PARTICIPLES. 

WE had formerly but two of these participles ; 
the present (as it is called) and the past ; 
but our old translators borrowed from other lan- 
guages and incorporated with our own four other 
participles of equal value. As with the adjectives, 
so with the participles, they did not abbreviate their 
own language in imitation of the others, but took 
from other languages their abbreviations ready 
made. The elder Stoics called this word Modum 
verbi casualem ; they would have said better adjec- 
tivum, as the circumstance of having cases was only 
a consequence of adjection. Instead oi participle, 
then, let this word be called generally a verb adjec- 
tive. We have the same occasion to adjective the 
verb as to adjective the noun ; and, by means of a 
distinguishing termination, not only the simple verb 
itself, but every mood and every tense of the verb 
may be made adjective, as well as the noun. And 
accordingly some languages have adjectived more, 
and some languages have adjectived fewer, of these 
moods and tenses, which are themselves merely ab- 



OF PARTICIPLES. 203 

breviations ; that is, nothing more than the circum- 
stances of manner and time added to the verb ; in 
some languages by distinguishing terminations. 
The greatest part of this modal and temporal abbre- 
viation we are forced to perform by auxiliaries ; 
that is, separate words signifying the added circum- 
stances. The verb adjective has all that the noun 
adjective has (as Perizonius had observed),* and 
something more, because the verb has something 
more than the noun. 

There are now six of these verb adjectives em- 
ployed in English, namely, the simple verb itself 
adjective ; two adjective tenses, and three adjective 
moods. 

1. The verb adjective. 

2. The past tense adjective. 

3. The potential mood active adjective. 

4. The potential mood passive adjective. 

5. The official mood passive adjective. 

6. The future tense active adjective. 

( 1 . ) The simple verb adj ective formerly terminated 
in and; now in ing. As the noun adjective signi- 
fies all that the unadjectived noun signifies, and no 
more (except the circumstance of adjection), so 
must the verb adjective signify all that the unad- 
jectived verb signifies, and no more (except the 
circumstance of adjection), but neither does the in- 
dicative mood, present tense, nor the present parti- 
ciple, as they are called, contain any adsignification 
of manner or of time ; its proper name is merely 

* Vide Sanctii Minervam, cap. 15, n. 1. 



204 OF PAETICIPLES. 

the verh. In this opinion, as to the adsignification 
of manner or time, there is nothing; new or singu- 
lar. Sanctius* both asserted and proved it by nu- 
merous instances in the Latin, from which a selec- 
tion is made : 

^' Et ahfui (j)as£) prqficiscens in Groeciam." — Cic. 
Ep. 

" Sed postquam amans accepit (^past) pretium 
pollicejis.^^ — Terent, 

" Ultro ad eum venies (fut.) indicans te amare." 
— Terent. 

" Twcniim fuffientem hsec terra videMt.^^ — Vir^. 

" Turn apri inter se dimicant indm'antes attritu 
arborum costas." — Plin. 

In the same manner we say, " Truth is always 
one and the same, from the beginning of the world 
to the end of it." 

Perizonius is opposed to this ; " Animadver- 
tendum est," he savs, " prcesejis vere participium 
posse accedere omnibus omnino periodis, in quibus 
etiam de prceterita Qtfutura re agitur." And then, 
after this admission of the fact, he proceeds to say, 
" Quia in pr^territa ilia re, quum gesta est, prcs- 
sensfuit; et in futura, item prsesens erit."t 

This is denounced as a mere evasion, since " a 
common termination (that is, a coalesced word) like 
every other word must always convey the same 
distinct meaning, and can only then be properly 
used, quando distinctio requhitur." 

(2.) The past tense adjective does signify the cir- 
cumstance of time (or tense), in Latin by distinct 

• Lib, 1, cap. 15. f Id. ib. n. 2. 



OF PAKTICIPLES. 205 

terminations, and in English by termination and 
auxiliaries. In English Ave sometimes add the ter- 
minations ed or en, and sometimes use the past tense 
itself, without any change of termination (though 
this latter custom has greatly decreased). The 
Latin makes an adjective of the past tense (as of 
the noun) by adding its article oc, i], ov, to the third 
person of the past tense — 

Amavit, amavitM5, amavtus, amatus. 

Docuit, docuitzz^, docitus, doctus. 

Legit, legitw5, legtus, lectus. 

AudiAat, audivitw5, audivtus, auditus. 
But as we often adject one substantive without 
any sign of adjection to another substantive, so are 
we accustomed to use the past time without any 
sign of adjection ; a practice which Lowth seriously 
condemns as " an abuse long growing upon us and 
continually making further encroachments," though 
he produces instances of this barbarism from many 
of our best writers. It is indeed the idiom of our 
language, though from greater familiarity with the 
Greek and Latin languages, we have yielded to 
their rules and customs. And since we can use 
our noun itself unaltered and our past tense itself 
unaltered, for the same purpose and with the same 
meaning, as the Greek and Latin use their adjec- 
tive and their participle ; it is manifest that their 
adjective and participle are merely their noun and 
past tense adjectived. 

The difference between the noun and past tense 
adjectived in our language, will be apparent enough 
on comparison of such words as the following : — 



206 OF PAKTICIPLES. 

A golden salver A gildec? or gilt frame 

The landec? interest The troops have landed 

Fat and fleshy A well flesh^c? sword 

A loveZy child A loyed wife 

A iaWiOus man A fame^ exploit 

A dread/wZ storm A dreaded tyrant 

A loathZy toad 1 A loathed toad 

Loath/wZ idleness \ LoathecZ idleness 

Loathsome life LoathecZ life 



CHAP. VIIL 

PARTICIPLES (continued), 

, ^ I ^HE potential passive adjective; that is, 
^ *^ JL having manner or mood adjectived. 

Under this new name we have our familiar ter- 
minations in able and ihle ; which Tooke, asserting 
that whatever the Latin has not from the Greek it 
has from the Gothic, believes to be originally the 
Anglo-Saxon or Gothic 'Khal, robur : and in this 
belief he is supported by Junius, who thinks it 
plain that we do not owe our own word able to the 
Romans, and refers to a passage in Caedmon, in 
which this word 'Kbal is used, in confirmation of 
his opinion. As a termination, however, together 
with the contraction He, we took it from the Latins, 
and took it very early to free ourselves from the 
periphrasis by which our oldest translators felt ob- 
liged to explain themselves. 



OF PARTICIPLES. 207 

[In 2 Cor. ix. 15. the Latin inerrahilis is (I find) 
in one version rendered, " that may not he teldP 
and in another, supposed to be earlier, it is (as 
in the MS. quoted by Tooke) " unenarrahle, or 
that may not be told." And in the very next 
chap. V. 11. (as I also find), sermo contemptihilis is 
in the one, " the word worthi to be dispisid ;^^ and 
in the other, " the word contemptible, or worthi for 
to be dispysid." In James iii. 17, the Latin sua- 
dihilis is in the one version, "Able to be counseiled ; " 
and in the other (as in Tooke's MS.), " suadible^'' 
that is, " esy for to treete, or to be treetid." And 
in the fifth eh. v. 17, Elias homo erat similis nobis 
passibilis — is, in the one version, "Elye was a deedli 
man lyk us ; " and in the other, " Hely e was a man 
lijk us, passible, or able for to suffre,^^^ Again, in 
Acts xxvi. 23, si passibilis Christus, in the one ver- 
sion is, " If Crist is to suffre ; " and in the other, 
" If Crist passible or able to sufire."] 

The best classic authors used their termination, 
bills, passively ; some few examples to the contrary 
are produced, and after the corruption and decay 
of the Latin language they are found in abundance ; 
as they may also be found (and the fact seems re- 
markable) in the old comedian, Plautus. Though 
it appears that our early translators introduced the 
passive signification when the Yulgate Latin set 
them the example ; yet, as in the instance of passi^ 
hilis, they were occasionally misled. [Other such 
instances may be found ; the Latin, delectabile as- 
pectu, delectabile oculis, are rendered delitable. The 
Latin desiderabile is rendered both desiderable and 



208 OF PAKTICIPLES. 

desireful.~\ And a large number of active usages 
soon followed, wMch Tooke proceeds to account 
for in the following (rather circuitous) manner: 
that they were taken from the French, who cor- 
rupted them from the Italian, thus, — our Anglo- 
Saxon /wZ/, in German voZ, became the Italian vole, 
— a sound pleasing to the Italian ear ; and they add- 
ed it to their words without sufficient regard to its 
signification, and where, I may add, our termination 
full would have been wholly inadmissible. Hence 
their abominei;oZe, amichei^oZe, capez;oZe, and many 
others, which the French by slovenly pronunciation, 
and not distinguishing between hile and vole, trans- 
formed into abomin^^Ze, amic«Z»Ze, capGZ>Ze, &c. &c. 
And thus our own y^oicdifull, passing through the 
German, Italian, and French, comes back to us in 
the corrupt shape of hie ; confounding those termi- 
nations whose distinct application and employment 
are so important to the different and distinct pur- 
poses of speech. 

We have various other corrupt terminations in 
hie, as double, treble, fable, table, syllable, dis- 
semble; from the Latin duplum, triplum, fabula, 
tabula, syllaba, dissimulare, etc. and tumble, grum- 
ble, crumble, etc. from the Dutch tumnelen, grom- 
melen, kruimelen, etc. 

(4.) The potential active adjective (that is, having 
manner or mood adjectived). For this we have 
two terminations ; ive, borrowed from the Latin, 
and corrupted from the substantive vis, and ic, from 
the Greek, corrupted from the substantive iayA)c. 
These terminations are thus contrasted by Scahger 
with the Latin His (hilis) : — 



OF PARTICIPLES. 209 

'^ Duas autem habuere apud Latinos^ totidem 
apud Grgecos terminationes ; in ivus, activam : in 
His (bills) passivam : Sic Gr^ci, aidOriTiKoV) id quod 
sensu prasditum est, aiaOrjTov* quod sensu percipi 
potest." — De Causis, L. iii. cap. 98. Thus in 
English, sensitive (that which is), endued with sense, 
that can or may feel, and sensible, that can or may 
be felt. Yet this word sejisible we employ in three 
different meanings, though we have three distinct 
terminations for the purpose of expressing those 
meanings. We have sense-ful, sensit-ive, sens-ible, 
— full of sense ; which can feel ; which may be felt. 
And yet we talk of, " A sensible man, who is very 
sensible of the cold, and of any sensible change in 
the weather." 

I subjoin a few instances of Greek distinction: 

Akovgtikoq ; that can or may hear ; auditive. 

AKovGTog ; that can or may be heard ; midible. 

OoariKog \ that can or may be seen ; visive. 

Oparoq ; that can or may be seen ; visible. 

A.udiitive we have not in general use.f 

AudiZ>Ze is common enough, so is visible; and 
\imve is correctly used by Berkeley. All the ab- 
breviations which we have in ive are from the La- 
tin, and those in ic from the Greek. Tooke asserts 
that we have not one single word of Anglo-Saxon 
origin, whose potential mood active is adjectived. 
He had forgotten — 

" The Coxcomb Bird so talkative and grave." 

* Words with this termination are called by Greek gramma- 
rians verbals in roq. 

f It may be found in Cotgrave, in v. Auditif. 
P 



210 OF PAETICIPLES. 

The word is common in our best writers and in 
our current speech. 

With the greater number of these abbreviations 
in ive we have not taken the unabbreviated verb : 
thus 2h\sitwe, aperitzi;^, crescw e. 

So with the Greek ic ; analytzc, apologetic, 
caustec. 

The French have immoderately abused these 
terminations, and we have in some instances fol- 
lowed their example. Thus missive is adopted by 
Shakespeare and others, and even by Dryden, who 
uses it for the contraction missile. He might have 
added by Swift and Pope ; the latter writes missile 
and missive with the same meaning. 

(5.) The official mood passive adjective is a name 
adopted from distress. It is intended to signify 
that mood or manner of using the verb by which 
we might couple the notion of duty with it; by 
which we might at the same time and in conjunc- 
tion with it, express ra ^tovTa, the things which 
ought, and the things which ought not, to be done. 
Most ancient grammarians called this the modum 
particijjialem. We have made little use of tliis 
mood: the words which we have adopted in it 
being barely these; Legend, reverend, dividend, 
prebend, memorandum; and several of these are 
abused in their application. 

Legend ; that which ought to be read. 

Reverend ; that which ought to be revered. 

Dividend; that which ought to be di"vdded, 
thouo'h the receiver means no such thino^. 

Peebend; that which ought to be afforded, 



OF PARTICIPLES. 211 

tliougli not uncommonly applied to him who re- 
ceives it. 

Tooke omits our common words, stupend-ous, 
tremend-ous. These expressions, however, is to, 
or is to he, are all that we have of our own to supply 
the place of this adjective, of the potential passive 
adjective, and also of the future tense adjective. 

We use our own home-bred circumlocutory ex- 
pression is to he when translating from the Latin, 
and anciently is to; thus Chaucer renders sper- 
nendus from Boethius, is to dispise ; and I find in 
the Nonnes Prestes Tale (the Cock and Fox), 
Chaucer writing, " Many a dreme ful sone is for 
to drede ; " And Dryden, " Here may you see that 
visions are to dread.^^ 

To the present time too, we say " is to hlame^^ 
when speaking of a person or action that ought to 
he blamed ; Culpandum, 

(6.) The future tense adjective, in which we have 
only two words. Future, venture, or adventure. 
The awkwardness of our substitutions for this fu- 
ture tense adjective will be manifest upon examin- 
ing the ancient, and even the modern, versions of pas- 
sages where \kn^& future abbreviation is to be found. 

[This awkwardness, however, was transmitted to 
us from the Anglo-Saxon. In Matt. xi. 3. 14. the 
Latin venturus is in the Anglo-Saxon version ren- 
dered to GOTn.-enne, and in the early version of the 
Wiclif Bible, to cwmin-ynge : in the later. He that 
schal come. Ventura ira is also in the early ver- 
sion, Wraththe to Gom-gnge ; and in the later. 
That schal come : so also, He is to dein-gnge ; he 



212 OF PAETICIPLES. 

is to idkynge : in the early, — is in the later. He that 
sclial cleme. He that schal take ; from Latin Jw6?2- 
caturus, accepturus. And Daeg to boTd-enne ; day 
to come. The participial termination ing seems 
formed from this Anglo-Saxon infinitive (which 
Hickes calls infinitivus derivatus) enne, or ig-enne. 

It is worthy of remark that the participial ter- 
mination end or and, is common in the early ver- 
sion of the Bible, and ynge in the later. Substantives 
in ung existed at the same time with this participle 
in and; it was a common termination in the North- 
ern languages. And hence probably our confusion 
of substantives in ing and participles in ing. See 
the Grammars of Walhs, Lowth, Crombie, &c. 

This future abbreviation ought at once to have 
been snatched immediately from the Latin, for 
these abbreviations are of great importance. A 
short, close, and compact method of speech answers 
the purpose of a map upon a reduced scale ; it as- 
sists greatly the comprehension of our understand- 
ing, and, in general reasoning, frequently enables 
us at one glance to take in very numerous and dis- 
tant important relations and conclusions, which 
would otherwise totally escape us. 

'^ And here," says our Author, ^' we conclude 
our discussion for the present. It is true that my 
evening is now fully come, and the night fast ap- 
proaching ; yet if we shall have a tolerably length- 
ened twilight, we may stiU perhaps find time 
enough for a farther conversation on this subject ; 
and finally (if the times will bear it) to apply this 
system of language to all the different systems of 
metaphysical (that is, verbal) imposture." 



OF PARTICIPLES. 213 

That this twilight, which has now long sunk in 
darkness, should be so employed, was most devoutly 
to be wished; and, as Mr. Tooke declared in 1798, 
that all he had further to communicate upon the 
subject of language had then been amongst his 
loose papers for upwards of thirty years, I, for a 
long time, thought I might indulge a reasonable 
hope that we should be permitted to accompany 
him to the close of his speculations ; but that hope 
has sustained its disappointment. 

What is truth? said jesting Pilate, and would 
not stay for an answer. What is the verb? ex- 
claims the serious reader of the ETrea IlrfpoEvra, 
and cannot obtain one-. 



WHAT IS THE VEEB? 

TO this question it is now incumbent upon me 
to address myself, and I shall in the first 
place collect some remarks scattered through the 
work, in order to ascertain, if possible, what some- 
thing more it is, in the author''s conception, that 
belongs to the verb than belongs to the noun, and 
then to determine w^hat name, in consequence, it 
will be proper to impose upon that necessary part 
of speech.* 

* To the definitions of the verb, quoted by Tooke, add the two 
following : 

"Verbum est pars orationis attributum de subjectoaffirmans." 
— HiCKES, Gram. Franco-Theotisca, p. 62. 

Dalgarno, Ars Signorum, allows only one part of speech, the 
7wun. 

Cceteras vero vulgatas sic habitas esse inter flexiones casus hujus 
numerabo. 



214 WHAT IS THE TERB ? 

In tne first place, as to the use of the verb, it is 
necessary to repeat what we were early told, " That 
the business of the mind, as far as it concerns lan- 
guage,* extends no further than to receive impres- 
sions, that is, to have sensations or feelings. What 
are called its operations are merely the operations 
of language.! A consideration of ideas, or of the 
mind, or of things (relative to the parts of speech), 
will lead us no farther than to NoUNS, that is, the 
signs of these unpressions or names of ideas. The 
other part of speech, the verb, must be accounted 
for from the necessary use of it in communication. 
It is, in fact, the communication itself; [the com- 
munication, that is, of those ideas or impressions of 
which nouns are the signs;] and therefore well de- 
nominated Vr]fjia, dictum. For the verb is quod lo- 
quimur; the noun de quo,''^\ 

We are met at the outset with a declaration that 
the verb does not imply an assertion. How then, it 
is asked, is the verb Ibo to be accounted for ? By 
showing that Ibo is not the simple verb, but that, 
though containing only three letters, it consists of 
three words; two verbs and a pronoun. In the 
Greek verb \-^vai (from the ancient Ew, or modern 
Et^it); in the Latin, /-re, and the English verb, 
to hie, or to hi, Anglo-Saxon Hig-sm, the infinitive 
termination, evai, and re (and he might have in- 
cluded the Anglo-Saxon an), make no more a part 
of the Greek and Latin (and Anglo-Saxon) verbs, 

* Chap. 3. f See ante, ch. 2. 

I Veteres — in verbis vim sermonis, in nominibus materiam 
(quia alterum est quod loquimur, alterum de quo loquimur) esse 
judicaverunt,— Quint. 1. i. c. 4. 



WHAT IS THE VERB ? 215 

than our infinitive prefix to makes a part of the 
English verb to Me. The pure and simple verbs 
are / (or Et) in the Greek ; / in the Latin ; and 
Hie or Hi in the English. Inverting our common 
order of speech, Icli wol (I will) Hie or Hi to suit 
the order of the Greek and Latin, the assertion in 
the three languages will stand thus : — 

Hi Wol Ich 1 Go 

I Vol O, that is. Ego i will 

I j3ot;X Ew, that is, Eyw J I 

In the Greek j3ouX only is the verb ; in the La- 
tin vol; in the English wol (will). O in the Latin, 
and Ew in the Greek, are the pronouns Eyw, Ego ; 
not far from our own old English pronoun Ich or 

A Latin and Italian verb, in the same future 
tense, are thus resolved : 

Audi-Z»o was the ancient form ; then audi-am. 
Audi-(re) Vol-o I will to hear 
Audi-(re) Am-o I desire to hear 
Udir-(e) H-o I have to hear. 
It is quite clear that our Author's process in the 
construction of words is that of adjection. 

1, We have the simple noun (called substan- 
tive for the sake of distinction), the name of our 
impressions or ideas. Cases and numbers are 
formed by adjection of terminations having distinct 
meanings of their own. 

2. Then we have the noun made adjective by 
the addition of a final syllable directing the adjec- 
tion of another noun, and from them in like manner 
some adverbs are formed. 



216 WHAT IS THE VEEB ? 

3. Then comes again the noun, the mere noun, 
which in English is made a verb by the adjection 
of to placed before it, and in the Greek, Latin, and 
other languages by their respective terminations, 
each with its distinct meaning. Our to supplanted 
the Anglo-Saxon an. 

In To, then, thus adjected or preposed to the 
noun, we are to find the difference between the 
mere iioun and the noun invested Avith the verbal 
character. 

We must therefore return to the preposition To, 
which is so important a word, that nothing said of 
it can be with propriety omitted. We must bear 
in mind our Author's derivation ; * for " After this 
derivation, it will not appear in the least myste- 
rious or wonderful that we should, in a peculiar 
manner in English, prefix this same word To to the 
infinitive of our verbs. For the verbs, in English, 
not being distinguished, as in other languages, by 
a peculiar termination, and it being sometimes im- 
possible to distinguish them by their place, when 
the old termination of the Anglo-Saxon verbs was 
dropped, this word to (that is, act) became neces- 
sary to be prefixed, in order to distinguish them 
from nouns, and to invest them with the verbal 
character; for there is no difference between the 
noun love and the verb to love but what must be 
comprised in the prefix To. The infinitive, there- 
fore, appears plainly to be what the Stoics called 
it, the very verb itself, pure and uncompounded 
with the various accidents of mood, of number, of 

* Tadi; act, effect, result, consummation. 



WHAT IS THE VERB ? 217 

gender, of person, and^ in English, of tense ; which 
accidents are in some languages joined to the verb 
bj variety of termination, and in some by an addi- 
tional word signifying the added termination. And 
if our English Grammarians and Philosophers had 
trusted something less to their reading, and a little 
more to their own reflection, the very awkward- 
ness and imperfection of our own language in this 
particular of the infinitive, would have been a great 
benefit to them in all their difficulties about the 
verb, and would have led them to understand and 
explain that, which the perfection of more artificial 
and improved languages contributed to conceal 
from others. For it is a great advantage, which 
an English Philosopher has over those who are ac- 
quainted with such languages only which do this 
business by termination. For though there are 
good reasons to believe that all these terminations 
may likewise be traced to their respective origin, 
and that, however artificial they may now appear 
to us, they were not originally the effect of preme- 
ditated and deliberate art, but separate words, by 
length of time corrupted and coalescing with the 
words of which they are now considered as the 
terminations; yet this was less likely to be sus- 
pected by others. And if it had been suspected, 
they would have had much farther to travel to 
their journey's end, and through a road much more 
embarrassed ; as the corruption in those languages 
is of much longer standing than in ours, and more 
complex."* 

* Div. of Parley, vol. i. p. 350, et seq. 



218 WHAT IS THE VERB ? 

The English grammarians " should not have re- 
peated the error that the infinitiye was a mere 
noun ; since it was found necessary in English to 
add another word (namely) to^ merely to distinguish 
the infinitive from the noun, after the infinitive had 
lost that distinguishing termination, which it had 
formerly." " There are certainly other parts of 
the Enoiish verb, undistino^uished from the noun 
by termination ; but the truth is, that to them also 
(and to those parts only which have not a distin- 
guishing termination) as well as to the infinitive, 
is this distinguishing sign equally necessary and 
equally prefixed. Do (the auxiliary verb, as it 
has been called) is derived from the same root, and 
is indeed the same word as to. The difference be- 
tween a T and a D is so very small, that an etymolo- 
gist knows by the practice of languages, and an 
anatomist by the reason of that practice, that in the 
derivation of words it is scarcely worth regarding.* 
And for the same reason that to is put before the 
infinitive, DO used formerly to be put before such 
other parts of the verb, which likewise were not 
distinguished from the noun by termination. And 
as we still say, I do love, instead of I love. And 
I jyoed or did love, instead of I loved. But it is 
worth while to observe, that if a distinguishing 
termination is used, then the distinguishing do or 
DID must be omitted, the termination fulfilling its 
ofl&ce. And therefore we never find — I did loved, 
or he DOTH loveth. But I did love. He doth 
love. 

* See ante, p. 31. 



WHAT IS THE VEKB ? 219 

" It is not indeed an approved practice at pre- 
sent, to use DO before tliose parts of the verb, they 
being now by custom sufficiently distinguished by 
their place. And therefore the redundancy is now 
avoided, and DO is considered, in that case, as un- 
necessary and expletive. 

However it is still used, and is the common 
practice, and should be used, whenever the distin- 
guishing place is disturbed by interrogation, or by 
the insertion of a negation, or of some other words 
between the nominative case and the verb. As — 

He does not love the truth. 

Does he love the truth ? 

He does at the same time love the truth. 

And if we choose to avoid the use of this verbal 
sign, DO, Ave must supply its place by a distinguish- 
ing termination to the verb. As — 

He loyeth not the truth. 

JuOY eth he the truth? 

He at the same time loYeth the truth. 

Or where the verb has not a distinguishing ter- 
mination (as in plurals). 

They do not love the truth. 

Do they love the truth ? 

They do at the same time love the truth. 

Here if we wish to avoid the verbal sign, we 
must remove the negative, or other intervening 
word or words, from between the nominative case 
and the verb; and so restore the distinguishing 
place. As — 

They love not the truth. 

Love they the truth ? 

At the same time they love the truth : or — 



220 What is the verb ? 

They, at the same time, love the truth."* 

And thus these methods of using To and Do, 
^' arise from the peculiar method, which the English 
language has taken to arrive at the same necessary 
end, which other languages attain by distinguish- 
ing termination.^'' 

Case, gender, number, are no parts of the noun. 
Mood, tense, number, person, are no parts of the 
verb. But these same circumstances, frequently 
accompanying the noun and the verb, are then sig- 
nified by other words expressive of these circum- 
stances : and ao-ain, in some lano-uao-es, these latter 
words, by their perpetual recurrence, have coa- 
lesced with the noun and verb ; their separate sig- 
nification has been lost sight of (except in their 
proper a23plication), and these words have been 
considered as mere artificial terminations of the 
noun and verb. The proper application of these 
coalesced words, or terminations, to nouns, has 
been called declension; and to verbs, has been 
called conjugation. 

[From this discussion on the virtue of the pre- 
position to, it is clear that place has some claim to 
consideration ; since by it the verb may sometimes 
be distinguished, and in such cases the prefix to or 
do may be dispensed with. We have already been 
instructed in the efiect of place, that is of position or 
apposition, as it concerned the prepositions, when 
those prepositions are nouns, that each of them, 
ejusmodi est ut ex ed et alia substantia (to which it 
is prefixed, postfixed, or in any manner attached) 

— * Div. of Purley, v. i. p 355, et seq. 



WHAT IS THE VEEB ? 221 

unum intelligi queat.* We have also seen that 
the apposition or adjection denoted by the hyphen 
has the full force of an adjective termination. It 
seems to follow that i£ place could always discrimi- 
nate with sufficient clearness and certainty the 
usage of a noun, as noun merely, as the " de quo" 
or the " materia sermonis," from its usage as the 
" quod loquimur," or the " vis sermonis," there 
would be no necessity for any established prefix or 
postfix to accomplish the purpose.] 

But as place was not found at all times adequate 
to the discrimination required, some additional 
word, as a constant prefix or postfix, was resorted 
to for the purpose. 

In our language when the Anglo-Saxon ter- 
mination was dropped, the additional word to or 
DO was employed as a prefix. And to, so pre- 
fixed, makes the noun to which it is prefixed a 
verb ; (such is our Author's homely expression,)^ 
invests it with a verbal character ; constitutes the 
infinitive or very verb itself; and thus at the same 
time shows that the infinitive is not a mere noun, 
as some grammarians have taught. 

When we write do before a noun, we call it an 
auxiliary verb ; we should call it an auxiliary noun; 

* Diversions of Purley, i. 194, et supra, p. 63. 

f Dr. Lowth says, " The preposition to before the verb makes 
the infinitive mood." Now this is manifestly not so, for to placed 
before the verb loveth, will not make the infinitive mood. He 
would have said more truly that to, placed before some nouns, 
makes verbs. (Diversions of Purley, vol. i. p. 352, note.) 
[Lowth's verb is no verb, until to is placed before it. Neither 
will to make all nouns verbs ; it will not make Lover, a verb, 
though it wiU make Love one.] 



222 WHAT IS THE VERB ? 

and as, wlien preposed to a noun, it invests that 
noun with a verbal character, we thus arrive at 
the quod loquimur — Act, and the sensation conse- 
quent ; but as every act must have an agent, and 
every consequence a cause, we necessarily look for 
the noun, the name of the person or thing, de quo, 
that act is spoken; and, by virtue of the two, 
complete a sentence, or, as the logicians term it, 
proposition. 

It is the part of this proposition to affirm or 
deny, and it must, as the logicians also express 
themselves, consist of the subject (subjectum est 
id de quo) and the predicate (pr^dicatum est id 
quod de eo, affirmatur vel negatur). 

Neither to love or do love affirm or deny any 
thing of any thing ; both noun and verb, as gram- 
marians and logicians teach, are necessary for that 
purpose ; or some word, pro nomine, as / do love. 

But though to or do love affirm nothing, they 
are in a condition to do so ; they can or may do so, 
they form one complex term, and are affirmative f 
they are affirmative of act with agent, and being 
so affirmative of act, and of act alone, the title of 
NouisT Active may with significant propriety be 
applied to designate the something more, that the 
verb is than the mere noun, or noun substantive. 

* "We must bear in mind the important force of distinct termi- 
nations ; and of the difference on which our Author consequently 
insists between adjected, and adjectit e ; between that which ?s 
laid close, and that which may lie close. *' One word, or one ter- 
mination," our Author insists, " should be used with one signifi- 
cation, and for one purpose." It is worthy of remark that the 
names of moods terminate in ice. 



WHAT IS THE VEEB ? 223 

In like manner, it has before appeared that the 
circumstance " can or may adject," is the some- 
thing more that the noun adjective is, than the 
noun substantive. 

But the verb is a noun affirmative ; a noun that 
can or may, by the help of another noun, affirm or 
complete an affirmation. And thus we arrive at 
that operation of language, commonly called an 
operation of the mind ; namely, that of affirming, 
or in one word (as Wallis suggests) of asserting ; 
of which I have spoken sufficiently at the begin- 
ning of this little book.* 

We may now complete our definition of a verb ; 
or description of its functions in the operations of 
lano;uao;e. 

A Verb, or noun active, or affirmative of act, 
is the complex name, affirmative of a mere noun, 
that is, the substantive noun, or its substitute, a 
pronoun ; (the de quo) with itself, the noun active, 
(the quod\o(^\m.Vix)\ and thus, when the affirmation 
is made, when the noun and verb are ad-firmed, a 
proposition is formed affirming what with that 
of which. 

And this affirmative power of our preposed TO 
or DO is denoted in the classical and other lan- 
guages by a termination or sequent word ; observ- 
ing an order the reverse of our own. 

Ought I not, to use the expression of Johnson, 
ought I not " to tremble at my own temerity," 
when I say, this is my answer to the long unan- 

* Remarks on the tbree first chapters. 



224 WHAT IS THE YEEB ? 

swered question, " What is the verb ? What is that 
peculiar differential circumstance, which, added to 
the definition of the noun, constitutes the verb ? " 

But the matter does not end here. In what 
manner is the verb to contribute in the application 
of this system of language, of " this clothing of the 
whole nature of man,"* to the different systems of 
metaphysics, which our Author stigmatizes with 
the name of " Metaphysical (that is), of verbal im- 
posture." 

Quid valeaxt humeri is a fearful question 
for an octogenarian to answer ; one too who is very 
sensibly conscious that he is no Entellus to wield 
the gauntlets of Eryx. Nor would he indeed have 
been so bold, at a time of life when memory fails, 
and perception dims, as to attempt the labour of 
this little volume, if at this hour he had had to en- 
counter the difficulty of providing and preparing 
the materials for it.| 

The mantle of Home Tooke has long remained 
unhonoured by a claimant ; nor is it my ambition 
to aspire to that character. My views are less 
lofty ; and my exertions will be discreetly directed 
to illustrating the virtue (if I may so say) of the 
Verb, and to nothing more. Yet not without a 
hope to avail something by this restricted effort. 

I will begin with the often quoted words, TO 
love, or DO love. To or do, otherwise ACT or 
CAUSE is placed in apposition, with the name of 
the consequence or effect, the sensation Love : 
and so in all other cases. In to or do laugh, burn, 

* See ante, p. 97. f See ante. Pref. p. 1. 



WHAT IS THE VERB ? 225 

lament, &c. the infinitives or very verbs them- 
selves; act or cause is placed in apposition with 
effect or consequence, — the sensation laugh, burn, 
lament, &c. and to or do laugh, burn, lament, mean 
respectively — cause sensations, laugh, burn, la- 
ment. 

And I DO love, consequently means, I do cause 
(to myself) the sensation — Love: that is, the 
sensation of which the mere or substantive noun 
Love, is the name. And so again in all the other 
cases, laugh, burn, lament, &c. 

To apply this interpretation to other common 
usages of speech : — 

The sun is hot. He is hot. 

The bell rings. He rings the bell. 

The rose smells sweet. I smell a rose. 

That horse walks well. I walked my horse home. 

That horse runs fast. I ran that horse at Ascot. 

He eats no bread. The bread eats stale. 

He driiiks no beer. The beer drinks sour, &c. 

And this exposition of the virtue or peculiar 
function of the verb, I shall further practically ex- 
emplify and enforce in the following remarks on 
the words 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

TO such of my younger readers (and of such I 
hope there will be many) who are not lost 
in the metaphysical distinction of Thing {Rei seu 
JEnt-is) into Substance and Accident, it may be 



226 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

useful and sufficient for tliem to know, that Sub- 
stance was the Ens per se, and Accident the 
Entis ens (which I cannot undertake to trans- 
late into English). Those true, and truly saga- 
cious philosophers, the authors of the Memoirs of 
Martinus Scriblerus,* to whom I have before been 
indebted, will illustrate the many Aristotelean 
accidents to wliich substance is exposed, as the 
Doctors of the Schools were accustomed to ex- 
pound them, and will at the same time acquaint 
them with the learned names by Avhich they are 
honoured in our treatises on Logic. 

" Cornehus," they tell us, " was forced to give 
Martin sensible images. Thus, calling up the 
coachman, he asked him what he had seen in the 
Bear-Garden? The man answered, he saw two 
men fight a prize ; one was 2, fair man, a Sergeant 
in the Guards; the other black, a butcher; the 
Sergeant had red breeches, the butcher blue ; they 
fought upon a stage, about four o'clock, and the 
Serjeant wounded the butcher in the leg. Mark 
(quoth Cornelius) how the fellow runs through the 
Predicaments, Men, substantia ; Two, quanti- 
ties; Fair and Black, qualitas ; Serjeant and 
Butcher, relatio ; Wounded the other, actio 
etpassio; YiG'H.TiNG, situs ; Stage, wZ'z; Two 
O'CLOCK, quando ; Blue and red Breeches, ha- 
bitus:' 

I do not know how these far-famed categories 
or predicaments of the great Father of logic can 
be more effectually or agreeably unpressed on the 



Chap. 



r 



SUBSTANCE AKD ACCIDENT. 227 

minds of those for whom I intend them, than by 
the above lesson of Cornelius ; and for quoting it, I 
plead the authority of the most sensible of Roman 
poets : — 

Kidentem dicere verum 
Quid vetat ? 

It is unfortunate that our Author has left no 
exposition of any one word ending in ence or ance, 
from the Latin present participle. I will conclude 
with an attempt to apply his general principles to 
a word in ance, that has been, and is likely long to 
be, the cause of many a fierce debate — the word 
Substance. 

Substance is aliquid substans, id quod sub stat ; 
any thing understanding, or that which stands 
under, and thus sustains any thing that stands or 
is placed upon it ; as the foot sustains the leg ; the 
leg the thigh ; and the thigh the rest of the body. 

Everywhere indeed we observe substance; — 
above, beneath, around, there is substance support- 
ing substance : there is the great globe * itself for 
man and beast to rest and move upon ; there is the 
expanse of waters, on which leviathan may float ; 
there is the air aloft, on which the winged bird 
may sustain its flight. All this was obvious enough, 
but it did not satisfy the subtle perspicuity of the 
philosopher; and he unfortunately introduced the 
distinction between Substance and Accident, 
maintaining that accidents are not substances ; and 
seeing throughout the imiverse substance support- 

* Itself (the sacred historian tells us), ^wpported : " The pillars 
of the earth are the Lord's, and he hath set the world upon them." 
— 1 Sam. ii. 8; 



228 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

ing substance, and that sucli support was a neces- 
sary condition, they supposed an equal necessity 
for a something, an aliquid substans or substratum, 
" to sustain, maintain, or hold together, the quali- 
ties or accidents of matter and spirit." 

This word will strikingly exemplify the assertion 
of our Author, that the main subject of Locke's 
Essay was the force of terms ; and if Locke had 
been aware of that, and had judiciously availed 
himself at the outset of the aid of etymology, and 
kept it faithfully in sight, as he proceeded in his 
enquiries, he would have kept clear of the confu- 
sion in which he is confessedly involved. 

Li his chapter on Innate Principles* he intro- 
duces us to this word Substance ; and all that he 
there or afterwards has to say concerning it relates 
to the meaning, of which it is the sign. He first 
tells us that, " we signify nothing by it, but only an 
uncertain supposition of we know not what (that 
is, of something, whereof we have no particular 
distinct positive) idea, which we take to be the sub- 
stratum, or support, of those ideas we do know." 
And, subsequently, when treating of this uncertain 
supposition of Ave know not what, as a complex 
idea, he says, " It is but a supposed I know not 
what, to support those ideas we call accidents.''''^ 
A more perfect description of a nonentity could 
scarcely be invented. 



* B. i. c. 4, § 18. 

f B. ii. c. 23, § 15. The whole of this chapter requires to be 
carefully perused. Such explanations as the above, of the word 
Substance, are frequently repeated. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 229 

It is in this same chapter, " of the complex ideas 
of substances," that he so admirably illustrates his 
great difficulties in treating of such ^' creatures of 
the mind/' by a reference to the Indian, who fan- 
cied an elephant to be the support of the world ; a 
tortoise to be the support of the elephant, and this 
same " I know not what" of the tortoise. 

He then seems to catch a glimpse of the use of 
etymology, and to obtain a temporary relief from 
it. " Those qualities," he says, " we find existing ^ 
we imagine cannot subsist, ' sine re substante,' 
without something to support them, and we call 
that support substantia, which, according to the 
true import of the word, is in plain English, " stand- 
ing under or upholding."* And thus it is that the 
meaning of the word substance, as a general term, 
comes within the scope of the reasoning which I 
have applied to the words difference and resemblance. 
Wherever these latter are used, and no sensible 
quality exists, it is not the immediate sign of an 
idea; and whenever the word substance is used, 
and no res or aliquid substans exists, it is not the 
sign of an idea, but both are the complex and ge- 
neral signs or names of a collection of ideas — of 
things differing, things resembling, things subsist- 
ing. And this of necessity, for " Our faculties," 
says Locke most truly, " carry us no farther to- 
wards the knowledge and distinction of substances, 
than a collection of those sensible ideas (^ simple ideas 
co-existent together') f which we observe in them." J 

* B. ii. c. 23, § 2. j B. ii. c. 23, § 3. + B. iii. c. 6, § 9. 



230 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDEKT. 

In other words, that our ideas of substances are 
nothing else than a collection of ideas, of sensible 
quahties or accidents united in one object; — of a 
variety of colours and forms, for instance, so united 
in one object, — a tree, a bird, — and each making 
its simple, single, distinct impression on the mind. 
And of these collections, as I have before expressed 
myself, we employ the complex and general term 
substance as the name or sign. 

In his letter to the Bishop of Worcester,* I 
must observe, Locke again makes a reference to 
etpnology ; " I suppose it will be true that suh~ 
stantia is derived from a suhstando, and that that 
shows the original import of the word." And that 
he was fully aware of the essential importance of 
knowing the original import of words, that is, of 
their intrinsic meaning — the impressions or ideas 
of which they are the sign — in writing concerning 
the human understanding, he thus plainly, in the 
same letter, tells us : "I have ever, my Lord, 
long been of opinion, as may be seen in my book,t 
that if we knew the original of all the words we 
meet with, we should thereby be very much helped 
to know the ideas they were first applied to, and 
made to stand for." " I doubt not," he says in 
another place,j: " but if we could trace them to 
their sources, we should find, in all languages, the 
names for things, that fall not under our senses, to 
have had their first rise from sensible ideas. By 

* Works, vol. i. p. 471* 4to. edition. 

t See, particularly, b. iii. c. 1. " Of Words or Language in 
general.'* % Id. ib. § 5. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 231 

which we may give some kind of guess, what kind 
of notions they were, and whence derived, which 
filled their minds who were the first beginners of 
language; and how Nature, even in the naming 
of things, unawares suggested to men the originals 
and principles of all their knowledge."* Locke 
saw the right course, but did not. pursue it, and 
the perplexing consequences to himself are mani- 
fest throughout the whole of his great work. 

As I am naturally carried on from the opinions 
of Locke to those of Berkeley, I shall be excused 
for repeating the trite observation, that the " Essay 
on the Human Understanding," prepared the way 
for " The Principles of Human Knowledge ; " for 
so, to some extent, it did. f 

The remarks I have already made, on the con- 
nection of language with the philosophy of the 
former, have obviously prepared the way for those 
I have now to make on some tenets maintained by 
the latter, with a logical subtlety to which it would 
be difi&cult to find a rival. 

Every acquisition of knowledge gains for us a 
footing for a further advance ; and that for which 
Locke is so justly famed, as I have before had oc- 
casion to observe, is by the reasoning which he 
employed to prove the truth of a position almost as 
old as philosophy itself. Of the same antiquity is 
the doctrine which Berkeley undertook to confirm 

* See ante, the quotation from " Guesses at Truth." 

f This work was published twenty years after the Essay ; five 

after the death of Locke 5 when Berkeley had just completed his 

twenty -fifth year. 



232 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

by reasoning : but he was no sceptic ; he had no 
doubt of the soundness of his own conclusions as a 
philosopher, nor of his own knowledge, and means 
of acquiring it, as a man. 

Locke had proved that from our senses, and 
from them alone, we receive all our ideas ; Berke- 
ley endeavoured to mark the extent to which our 
senses can carry us in the acquisition of ideas, and 
in doing so effectually banished a substratum of 
material qualities: for this undoubtedly Locke 
had prepared the way ; he had reduced this sub- 
stratum to a nescio quid ; and maintained that our 
senses could not carry us to a knowledge of it. 
But Berkeley's object was not only to destroy but 
to establish : to destroy what he considered to be the 
main pillar and support of scepticism, atheism, fa- 
talism, and idolatry. And this was the doctrine 
" vulgarly held by philosophers : That the sensi- 
ble qualities exist* in an inert, extended unper- 
ceiving substance,! which they call matter, to 
which they attribute a natural subsistence,:]: exte- 
rior to all thmking beings, or distinct from being 
perceived by any mind whatsoever, CA^en the eternal 
mind of the Creator, wherein they suppose — only 
ideas of the corporeal substances created by him ; 
if indeed they allow them to be at all created. "§ 
This was the doctrine he meant to destroy ; and 



* That is, cause a sensation of existence. 

f That is, in re substante. 

X The reader will find in Locke's Works (vol. i. p. 734) an 
amusing dialogue on subsistence between the Socia of Plautus, and 
a Countryman. § Principles, § 91. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 233 

here he should have rested content with his suc- 
cess. That which he proposed to estabhsh was, 
^^ That the unthinking beings (that is, sensible 
qualities) perceived by sense, have no existence 
distinct from being perceived, and cannot therefore 
exist in any other substance, than those unextended, 
indivisible substances, or spirits, which act, and 
think, and perceive them."* He coincides with 
Locke, that " all sensible qualities have need of a 
support, as not being able to subsist by themselves." 
And he endeavours to relieve his theory from a 
strong prejudice against it, by declaring that " If 
there be any thing which makes the generality of 
mankind averse from the notions I espouse, it is a 
misapprehension! that I deny the reality of sensible 
things : " — Sensible things and sensible qualities are 
equivalent terms. 

And it is in the distinction between substances 
and sensible qualities (inasmuch as the latter re- 
quired the support of the former), that we are re- 
called to the distinction made by grammarians in 
their distribution of language into parts of speech,:]: 
and in so doing, of considering the noun substan- 
tive to be the name of substances, and the noun 
adjective to be the name of attributes, accidents, 
or qualities, " a word added to the substantive to 
express its quality," § or which " only implies an 
attribute." || 



* Principles, § 91. 

t Works, vol. i. p. 187. Third Dialogue. See also, p. 42. 

X See ante, chap. 1. § Lowth. 

11 Harris, chap. 10. On this supposed difference between sub- 



234 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

If our Author's doctrine* be true, that the noun 
adjective is a noun substantive, and something 
more, we approach the root of the matter. But 
I must here premise that these observations can 
only affect those who may be now satisfied that they 
can safely go so far with our Author, and with all 
who are not " dark with excess of bright," as to 
believe, in the first place, that they receive im- 
pressions or ideas from sensible objects, that is, 
from things, the causes of impressions ; and in the 
second, that words are the names or signs of those 
objects, as perceived by the mind. 

We speak, for instance, of a leaden bowl ; we at- 
tribute to the bowl, as accident or quahty, the 
tiling, objected before us, lead; the sensible object 
(called substance), with its ideas or impressions of 
colour and form are here ob\dous enough. But 
there are other adjectives which we cannot so easily 
trace to the thing, of which they include within 
their meaning the name or sign ; but if we are 
con^dnced that all nouns — substantive and adjective 
— are signs or names of things, and not of things 
alone, as causes of our ideas or impressions, but of 
these latter as the effect of those causes, it follows 
that all adjectives attribute substances to sub- 



stances " and modes and properties," or accidents, Dr. Watts 
could perceive that we were led into a mistake " by the gram- 
matical form and use of words.'' And that " perhaps our logi- 
cal way of thinking by substances and modes, as well as our gram- 
matical way of talking by substantives and adjectives, help to delude 
us into the supposition.'' Logic, part i. chap. 2, note. The 
errors of the Logician and of the Grammarian are alike. 
* Infra, chap. 6, on adjectives. 



SUBSTAl^CE AND ACCIDENT. 235 

stances, whether under the name of substance, ac- 
cident, or quality. 

Substance, it has been said, is res suhstans, and 
is used with a subaudition of res. Accident, in 
like manner, is res accidens, and is also used with 
a subaudition of res. Quantitas, says Wallis, most 
truly, non differt a re (vel substantia) quanta ; qua- 
litas, it may be added, non differt a re (vel sub- 
stantia) quali. Sensible qualities, or qualities that 
may be felt, by which the mind may be acted or 
affected, I conclude are things or substances — 
quales. We cannot abstract or separate the quotes 
or the quanta, the accidens or substans, from the 
thing either in thought or speech. That these 
sensible qualities, that these things, says Berkeley, 
which " I see with mine eyes, and touch with 
my hands, do exist, really exist, I make not the 
least question. I do not argue against the exist- 
ence of any thing that we can apprehend either by 
sense or reflection."* He fully admits of sub- 
stances or things as combinations of sensible quali- 
ties, such as extension, solidity, &c., of which qua- 
lities we can have no idea but as of a thing ex- 
tended, solid, &c. It is against that thing — neither 
Substans, nor existens, nor accidens, quanta, nor 
qualis, of which we have no idea; this substra- 
tum or substance, imder the name of " Matter or 
material substance," as a support of accidents or 
qualities without the mind, that the ingenuity of 
Berkeley is aimed. For instance, I see with my 

* Principles J § 35. 



236 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

ejes, and press witli my liand^ a table : I perceive 
its colour and figure, its solidity and smootlmess, 
but with tbis I am not content: I wish to go 
furtber tban my senses will carry me, — transcen- 
dentally out of my senses (to use a common and 
very appropriate pbrase) ; I require a substance, a 
substratum, an aliquid substans, wbicb shall sup- 
port these sensible qualities of the table, as the legs 
support its surface, and as its surface supports the 
pressure of my hand. And of this substance the 
Bishop continues to say, " If the word substance be 
taken," he further says, " in a philosophic sense for 
the support of accidents or qualities without the 
mind ; then, indeed, I acknowledge that we take it 
away, if one may be said to take away that which 
never had any existence, not even in the imagina- 
tion."* 

Berkeley, admitting the existence of things, and 
external causes, as causes of ideas; of things, as 
combinations of sensible qualities, of which the 
mind receives impressions or ideas, admits that 
there is an occasional impropriety in his usage of 
the word idea; as the word idea is not used in 
common discourse to signify the several combina- 
tions of sensible qualities called things^ as it might 
be concluded that we eat and drink our ideas, and 
are clothed with our ideas, as the qualities that 
" constitute the several sorts of victuals and appa- 
rel exist only in the mind that perceives them."t 
If, from a knowledge of the causes and reasons of 
language, he had been aware that the verb, TO 

* Principles, § 37. f I^i^. § 38. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 237 

EXIST, meant, " To cause the sensation, impression, 
or idea of existence, or of things existing," he would 
have given a more satisfactory reason than he has 
done for allowing " that as we eat and drink and 
are clad with the immediate objects of sense, things 
would have been the more proper word ;" although 
these objects, these res ohjectce, cannot exist, cannot 
cause the idea of existence, unperceived or without 
the mind. This is no more than to say, that they 
cannot cause a sensation, or impression, or idea of 
existence, where there is no percipient or mind to 
receive it : — And this coincides completely with the 
dictum of Tooke, " No man, no truth." 

And here I must request the reader to bear in 
mind what has been before said of affirmation and 
negation, difference and resemblance; right and 
truth — including thing. Also the few remarks ad- 
dressed to the objections of the late Professor Stew- 
art, to Dr. Whately and Mr. Smart. 

It would have been well for philosophy if phi- 
losophers had sometimes amused themselves with 
experiments in conformity with a rule proposed, 
but not observed, by Dr. Johnson, for his own 
direction, that " the explanation and the word ex- 
plained should always be reciprocal," and if they 
had in the prosecution of their inquiries sometimes 
made an interchange of word and explanation, they 
must soon have found themselves lost in a wilder- 
ness of words, pursuing fictions or creatures of their 
own minds ; such as existences and substances, or 
subsistencies, without a thing existent or subsistent; 
and as attributes, with nothing to attribute. 



238 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

It is not necessary for me to enter further into 
the very ingeniously profuse expenditure of words, 
with which our two iUustrious countrymen may 
both be justly charged, and from which a know- 
ledge of the causes and reasons of philosophical 
grammar would have preserved them. Yet I feel it 
due to them, and the Author of " The Diversions 
of Purley" also, to subjoin a few observations, or 
rather the materials for the reader to make his own 
observations, with respect to the advance that, it 
may be presumed, has been made beyond the Essay 
of Locke and the Principles of Berkeley. I think 
it will appear on examination into their works, 
that Kttle else has been presented to us hitherto by 
modern doctors of metaphysics than old tenets 
under new names : that names are still the great 
subjects of debate, and that such must continue to 
be the case, until the inseparable connection of 
thought and speech be investigated and understood, 
and acknowledged also, as the only safe foundation 
for further inquiries and further progress. 

^^ In all German systems," says Mr. Carlyle,* 
" since the time of Kant, it is the first principle to 
deny the existence of matter ;" that is, as Berkeley 
denies it ; and so far, the German philosophers are 
just where Berkeley led and left them. 

The next step seems to have been to the Ego and 
NoN Ego — the subject and object — in other words 
(to borrow from Sir William Hamilton), ^^ the 
ideally known, as opposed to the really existent." 



* Miscellanies, vol. ii. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 239 

These correlations Sir William Hamilton* has 
detected in the expressions of Aristotle, the ra rifxiv, 
and the ra (^v<jh, the things in us, and the things 
in nature. 

And he also observes, that Berkeley has used 
the word objectively in the manner it is now used ; 
but no instance has been found in him of the use, 
as its opposite, of subjectively. Bishop Pearson, 
however, supplies one ; " And thus I have proved 
that the name of God, absolutely taken and placed 
subjectively, is sometimes to be understood of 
Christ."— O/z the Creed, Art. 2.t 

The manner in which these words are now used 
is thus more fully explained by the very learned 
editor of Reid : — | 

" The Ego, as the subject of thought and know- 
ledge, is now commonly styled by philosophers 
simply the subject ; and the subjective is a familiar 
expression for what pertains to the mind, or think- 
ing principle. In contrast or correlation to these, 
the terms object and objective are in like manner 
now in general use, to denote the NoN Ego, its af- 
fections and properties ; and, in general, the really 
existent, as opposed to the ideally known." 

* I think it is to be much regretted that Sir William Hamilton 
does not apply the great powers of his mind, and his extraor- 
dinary learning, on an original composition, rather than on 
editing and criticising the works of others. 

t It is thus explained by Todd, who introduced it into John- 
son's Dictionary, " Eelating not to the object but the subject." 
Dr. Watts in his Logic, Part ii. c. 2, § 8, states the difference 
between objective and subjective certainty. The one he concludes 
to be " in things, the other in our minds." 

$ Raid's Works, vol. i. p. 806, n. 



240 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

Coleridge concludes his reveries on the matter 
thus : — " Now the sum of all that is merely objec- 
tive, we will henceforth call Nature, confining the 
term to its passive and material sense, as compris- 
ing all the phcBnomena by which its existence is 
made known to us. On the other hand, the sum 
of all that is subjective we may comprehend in the 
name oiself, or intelligence.^'' 

The following passage from Berkeley will show 
that the only modern novelty is in words, or in 
adopting new names for old tenets.* 

" Besides all that endless variety of ideas, or 
objects of knowledge, there is likewise something, 
which knows or perceives them, and exercises divers 
operations, as willing, unagining, remembering 
about them. This perceiving, active being is what 
I call mind, spirit, or Myself."! And there are 
other passages running throughout his Principles 
and Dialogues to precisely the same effect. 

The phenomena of Coleridge are the sensible 
qualities of Locke and Berkeley ; and Ms self, or 
intelligence is their sentient or percipient being, 
and Berkeley's myself. 

I will produce two or three more short passages, 
in addition to the above, and to those I have before 
had occasion to quote, in which Berkeley's doc- 
trines appear to me to be the germs of those that 



* And even these new names, though " ratified and conve- 
nient," the Professor pronounces to be ambiguous, and proposes 
that each in turn should be proteron and each hysteron; thus, 
subject-object, and object-subject, that is, ideal-real, and real- 
ideal, t Principles, § 2. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 241 

have been maintained by the successors of Kant: 
perhaps they may prove to be so of those which 
they may hereafter maintain. 

" The vulgar are of opinion, that those things 
they immediately perceive are the real things ; and 
the philosophers, that the things immediately per- 
ceived are ideas, which exist only in the mind; 
which two notions put together do in effect consti- 
tute the substance of what I advance."* 

" If by ideas you mean objects of the understand- 
ing, or sensible things, which cannot exist f unper- 
ceived or out of the mind, then these things are 

ideas. ''^X 

" I am not for changing things^ into ideas, but 
rather ideas into things, since those immediate ob- 
jects of perception, which, according to you, are 
only appearances of things, I take to be the real 
things themselves. "j| 

A few words will not be inappropriate here on 
the terms 2?zternal and external, withm and with- 
out, so constantly occurring in the discussions of 
"philosophical speculators, on the existence of an 
external world. They do not seem to have taken 
the trouble to answer to themselves the question. 
What do we mean by this word external? They 
should have considered that it is a name which we 



* Works, vol. i. p. 216, Third Dialogue. 

f That is, " cause the sensation of existence." 

t Works, vol. i. p. 203. 

§ See in v. Truth : Observations on Theng. 

II Works, vol. i. p. 187, Third Dialogue. 



242 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

give to denote certain sensations different from 
those to which we give the name oiinternal ; that 
each class of sensations has causes different from 
the other, to which the different name is given. 

A bird in the hand, and a bird in a bush, are 
different objects, and cause different sensations; 
and, with relation to the hand, are distinguished 
by the names of internal and external. So also, a 
bowler at cricket receives different sensations from 
the ball in his hand, and the ball delivered against 
his adversary's wicket. To these sensations, with 
relation to the hand, are given these names of In- 
ternal and External, and to all bodies, all ob- 
jects, iu the same relation the same names are given; 
and they are so — external and internal, as they cause 
the same different sensations. 

Euffon imagines a man, just newly brought into 
existence, describing the illusion of his first sensa- 
tions, and pointing out the steps by which he ar- 
rived at Reality ; and this was effected by touch- 
ing an object, which he found to be no part of him- 
self. 

He opened his eyes : he imagined (^ those acci- 
dents') the azure of the sky, the verdure of the 
earth, the crystal of the waters, to make a part of 
himself. 

He closed his eyes, and was in darkness; he 
heard the whistling of the wind and the melody of 
the grove ; a light breeze wafted perfumes to his 
sense of smell, and he was persuaded that all this 
music, all these odours, were internal, — were within 
himself. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 243 

He opened his eyes again, and saw all restored 
that in darkness he had lost.* 

He moved, and every object appeared in motion. 

He touched his person: every part he touched 
returned the touch — sensation for sensation. 

He holds his hand at different distances be- 
fore his eyes, finds his sight to give uncertain in- 
formation, and resolves to rely on his sense of 
touch. 

Again he moves ; he strikes against a palm-tree ; 
the palm-tree does not return sensation for sensa- 
tion, as his own person, in every part of it, had 
done; and he perceives that there is something 
external, and which is not within himself, does not 
make a part of himself. 

This imaginary man had his senses about him, 
and he had learned much from them in a short 
time; he had learned that the palm-tree was a 
THING that he could touch as well as see : that it 
was a thing sensible by two senses — solid, extended, 
figured; that he could only see the azure of the 
sky, the verdure of the earth, the crystal of the 
waters; that he could only hear the whistling of 
the wind and the melody of the groves ; that he 
could only smell the perfumes wafted by the breeze. 
But he had not yet arrived at the subtlety of dis- 
tinguishing these sensations by the names of pri- 
mary and secondary qualities. 

* The apparitions that flit before us in dreams and frenzies, 
afford no confirmation to Berkeley's assertion, " That the suppo- 
sition of external bodies is not necessary for the producing our 
ideas." § 18. " For the dreams of sleeping men are," says 



244 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

He has learned that when he has closed his eyes 
there is a something wanting that with open eyes he 
saw ; he cannot find that something within himself; 
a certain impression or idea remains there^ but the 
things themselves are not ; — he cannot touch them 
there, and he learns the distinction between within 
and without; between things as thoughts of his 
mind, and things as causes of those thoughts. 

Analogous is the distinction before described, of 
the bird in the hand and the bird in the bush ; of 
the ball in the hand, and the ball in its rapid course 
to the goal ; and to the attendant sensations under 
the respective circumstances.* 

I have said that the Essay of Locke may be 
allowed to have prepared the way for the Pkin- 
CIPLES of Berkeley to a certain extent. The dif- 
ference between the doctrines of Locke and Tooke 
and those of Bishop Berkeley, was great in various 
respects. The two former considered things them- 
selves to be res ohjectcB to the senses ; and thus the 
causes of sensations received through those senses, 
and through them alone, and known only by their 
effects, and these effects called Ideas. 

Berkeley would change ideas into things, main- 
tain that they were the real things themselves, and 
thus assimilate or identify the distinct causes and 
effects of Locke and Tooke. 

He allowed the existence of things, or that things 
exist; that is, if the words have any meaning, 
cause the sensations or ideas of their existence, or 
of their being things existing ; but would not allow 

* I must again refer to wliat I have before said of this word 
Thing. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 245 

that they were existences in themselves, not the 
agents causing the sensations, but simply the agen- 
cies, or efficiencies rather, of the Supreme Being, 
without any intermediate causes, that is, without 
the interposition of any causes at all. 

He agreed with Locke and Tooke as to the ori- 
gin of ideas; — with Tooke he discarded Locke's 
doctrine of abstract or general ideas, and contended 
with Tooke, that words only were general or ab- 
stract. Further, he admitted external causes of 
ideas, that is, causes which act or produce effects 
on sentient beings, when being or existing within 
the reach of their action. He maintains the reaUty 
of sensible things : — if he had any meaning, lan- 
guage fails him in his attempt to express it ; for if 
these words have any signification, it is that things 
are things, and nothing more or less. But yet it 
appears that though things are sensible things, that 
is, things that may be felt, they are not the causes 
of what is felt, that is, of our sensations. They 
are not substances. 

Agreeing with Locke, " that all sensible qua- 
lities have need of a support," he rejects the " I 
know not what," assumed by his great predecessor 
in his search for a general idea of Substance, and 
maintains that the only substance or support in 
which unthinking beings or sensible qualities can 
exist is Spirit, even the Eternal Invisible Mind.* 

True indeed it is that to this Eternal Invisible 



* " Since," he says, " we are affected from without, we must 
allow powers (that is, things having power) to be without in a 
being distinct from ourselves. I will have it to be spirit ; you 
matter." — Principles, Part i. § 2. 



246 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

Mind we owe our being : " that," to use the ever 
quoted expressions of the Apostle, " he giveth life 
to all, and breath, and all things," that " in Him we 
live and move, and have our being ; " that we are 
created with senses, that w^e are sentient beings; 
that sensible objects exist, that they are ; that they 
cause sensations of their existence in us, different 
objects, different sensations; that things internal, 
as the bird in the hand, and things external, as the 
bird in a bush, are different objects, and cause dif- 
ferent sensations. 

It is to this Eternal Invisible Mind that we owe 
our own minds, and all the faculties of our minds ; 
by which we are empowered to will and to do; 
the faculty of uttering articulate sounds, of making 
those sounds stand as signs of our ideas ; of em- 
ploying them to communicate those, our ideas, to 
others; of using them to signify one, or few, or 
many ; of bringing them together as signs of col- 
lections, of combining, comparing, permuting these 
so signified collections ; of using them abstractedly 
without immediate reference to any thing or idea ; 
of constructing them into all those general laws, 
which regulate the moral and physical world, and 
by their instrumentality of acquiring all the know- 
ledge we possess; even that which, as beings 
created with finite faculties, we possess of Him — 
the Eternal Invisible Mind — the Author of All. 



SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 247 

It has not been forgotten, I hope, that according 
to the theory of language and correspondent philo- 
sophy, against which the doctrines of the Diversions 
of Purley are directed, " There must be as many dif- 
ferences of things as of signs," and as of things, so of 
ideas. Hence it followed that finding language to 
abound with complex, abstract, and general terms, 
they concluded that there must be so many com- 
plex, abstract, and general ideas. They could not 
otherwise account for the terms. Though suffi- 
ciently aware that it was language that perplexed 
them, and though the cry was almost unanimous 
that to language they must look for aid to resolve 
their perplexities ; not one has directed himself to 
the right source for that purpose — the manner of 
signification of words. 

This task our Author took upon himself to per- 
form, and I have, I trust, laid before the reader 
proof amply sufficient of his success. He has ac- 
counted for what the old grammarians could not — 
the origin of those terms, their manner of signifi- 
cation, and shown that they alone are complex, ge- 
neral, and abstract.* And he has thus relieved the 
philosopher from the composition of ideas and from 
the supposed existence of abstraction as an opera- 
tion of the mind. 

And yet, it must be confessed, we still find our- 
selves plunged and lost by modern Avriters of 
highest distinction in the wild waste of abstract 



* See ante, vol. i. chap. 2; and see vol. ii. ch. 2, for the opin- 
ions of Berkeley on abstract ideas and general terms. 



248 SUBSTANCE AND ACCIDENT. 

and complex ideas ; those ideas which, as Berkeley 
in his time said, " are in an especial manner thought 
to be the object of those sciences, which go by the 
name of logic and metaphysics, and of all that 
which passes under the notion of the most ab- 
stracted and sublime learning," (such as the tran-- 
scendentaKsm of the present day,) " and in all 
which one shall scarcely find any question handled 
in such a manner as does not suppose their exist-' 
ence in the mind, and that it is well acquainted 
with them."* 

* Berkeley, Principles. Introd. § 6. 



THE END. 



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